UES Rents Plummet But Essential Workers Don't Benefit: Study

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — Hundreds of apartments have become newly affordable on the Upper East Side since the pandemic began, but most essential workers don't live close enough to take advantage, according to a new report.

On the Upper East Side and Roosevelt Island, about 431 apartments were available with rents affordable to essential workers last year, compared to just six in 2019, according to the study by the real estate site Streeteasy.

The Upper East Side is one of the neighborhoods where rents have plummeted since the coronavirus first arrived. But relatively few essential workers were able to enjoy the benefits: the vast majority of such workers live in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens, in neighborhoods where rents barely budged or in some cases went up.

To find affordable apartments, the study used the average salary for New York's frontline essential workers — $55,973 — and found the listings where rent was no more than $1,400, or about 30 percent of the workers' monthly income.

Here is the affordable housing growth in each part of the Upper East Side:

Upper East Side

• Affordable inventory 2019: 6
• Affordable inventory 2020: 422
• Growth in affordable inventory: 6933%

Roosevelt Island

• Affordable inventory 2019: 0
• Affordable inventory 2020: 9

The study's data on essential workers comes from a March 2020 report by the city comptroller's office, which looked at the boroughs of residence for public transit workers, grocery, convenience and drug store employees, health care workers, child care providers and other front-liners.

Just 12 percent of those essential workers live in Manhattan, the report found, compared to 28 percent in Brooklyn, 22 percent in Queens and 17 percent in the Bronx.

Meanwhile, rents fell in nearly every corner of Manhattan during the past year. Only a few neighborhoods, including Chelsea, Inwood and the West Village had fewer affordable listings in 2020 than they did in 2019, the study found.

Related coverage:

• Upper East Side Rents Plummeted In 2020, Study Finds
• Upper East Side Barely Added Housing Since 2010, New Study Finds