{"id":5607,"date":"2026-07-28T23:09:20","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T23:09:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=5607"},"modified":"2026-07-28T23:09:20","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T23:09:20","slug":"exclusive-longtime-new-yorkers-fume-after-being-hit-with-massive-pied-a-terre-tax-bills-is-this-a-witch-hunt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=5607","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive | Longtime New Yorkers fume after being hit with massive pied-\u00e0-terre tax bills: ‘Is this a witch hunt?’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

New Yorkers were seething Tuesday after Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s administration alerted them they\u2019d be on the hook for the state\u2019s new pied-\u00e0-terre tax \u2014 which was explicitly sold as a levy targeting wealthy owners of luxury second homes.<\/p>\n

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Longtime residents \u2014 some who have called the Big Apple home for decades and own a single abode in the city \u2014 told The Post they were shocked to get hit with five-figure tax bills they believe were mistakenly mailed out, and are now being forced to navigate a bureaucratic labyrinth to prove it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhoever\u2019s behind this, who I can only assume is the mayor, didn\u2019t take the 30 seconds to research,\u201d said Karen Young, president and founder of New York and Paris-based beauty marketing company The Young Group, who has lived in New York since 1972.<\/p>\n

She was stunned when she received a letter from the city Department of Finance asking for $43,000 in pied-\u00e0-terre tax on her West 95th Street brownstone, which she\u2019s lived in with her husband for 30 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs this a witch hunt?\u201d she asked, exasperated.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just sort of line up all of these things and think \u2018why are you picking on us?\u2019\u201d Young said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a faithful New Yorker since 1972, I find it not only insulting but painful,\u201d she fumed, \u201cIs anybody paying any attention, or any thinking, or two minutes of research. Just look me up!\u201d<\/p>\n

Young said she went to the DOF\u2019s website to attempt to prove her permanent residency \u2014 but quickly hit a brick wall.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a cumbersome process to prove that I\u2019m a primary resident, which just seems absurd. My jury summons come here, I pay my taxes from here, my utilities,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Despite the department telling her the process to appeal or challenge the bill was as easy as uploading a driver\u2019s license, Young said she was forced to pay her estate lawyer to get the proper documentation after spending three fruitless hours on the website trying to do it herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cApparently they haven\u2019t checked their own website. And I\u2019m tech-savvy!\u201d she insisted.<\/p>\n

Once homeowners are notified by mail that the city has determined the tax is applicable to them, they appear to have little recourse to set the record straight if they believe they received the bill erroneously.<\/p>\n

The tax is meant to apply to one-to-3 family homes worth at least $5 million and co-ops and condominiums valued at $1 million or more \u2014 that are unoccupied, non-primary residences, according to the legislation approved by Albany lawmakers and Gov. Kathy Hochul this spring.<\/p>\n

Residents who received a bill but don\u2019t meet those criteria can appeal based on either their residence status or the property\u2019s valuation.<\/p>\n

Owners appealing based on residence status have a strict 30-day window from the notification date to submit their rebuttal directly to the DOF.<\/p>\n

Those who believe they were incorrectly hit with the tax because the city overestimated the value of their property must file an appeal form with the New York City Tax Commission by March.<\/p>\n

Diane Francis, a Canadian journalist, entrepreneur and self-described \u201cpart-time New Yorker,\u201d said she previously owned an apartment on the Upper East Side, but sold it and now has a pad on West 57th Street and Eight Avenue that she purchased in 2022.<\/p>\n

Despite it being her secondary residence, Francis pointed out that she spends \u201clots of money\u201d in the Big Apple, including sales and property taxes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s unfair to pick on people, and I don\u2019t know how they\u2019re going to police that \u2026 I think it\u2019s very foolish,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI pay condo fees, I pay real estate taxes \u2026 I go out and eat, I go to the theater, I go to movies, I spend money everywhere, I buy stuff. I mean, I am a profit center,\u201d she said, estimating she spends around three months a year in New York.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAnd for them to punish me as though I\u2019m some kind of a problem, when in actual fact I\u2019m not a problem, I\u2019m a benefit to the city, is beneath the intelligence that most New Yorkers have.\u201d<\/p>\n

An 81-year-old former Upper East Side and New Jersey resident, who asked her name not be publicized, said she received a letter from the DOF\u2019s Property Division alerting her she\u2019d be subject to a staggering $55,048 pied-\u00e0-terre tax on her one home in Manhattan, if she does not go online to prove she lives there full-time.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve always owned property in one place or another, but only ever owned one property,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The controversial surcharge \u2014 which Mamdani has touted as making good on his campaign promise to \u201ctax the rich\u201d \u2014 is little more than a shakedown on longtime residents, she railed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the city is just trying to find a way to get money, they should be more careful about who is a permanent resident and what a permanent resident is,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Adding insult to injury, the notice was addressed to her late husband of 53 years, with whom she co-owned the property while he was alive.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that it\u2019s addressed to my husband, who died six years ago, is outrageous,\u201d she fumed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have lived here for 30 years; it\u2019s my only residence. It\u2019s addressed to my husband, not me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI own this house, the City of New York didn\u2019t get that right.\u201d<\/p>\n

The letter instructed her to respond with proof of permanent residency by Aug. 21, warning her she\u2019d be on the hook for the full surcharge amount without being granted an exception.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe letter is wrong. The city should have checked this out and been more careful,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe city shouldn\u2019t just do these things without enough information, maybe they shouldn\u2019t be doing it at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

The DOF would not disclose how many notices were sent out, but under the original plan the number was supposed to be limited to 31,000 taxpayers.<\/p>\n

Puzzlingly, The Post\u2019s Monday review of a document dump in which the DOF published the names and addresses of property owners who could be hit with the new tax found more than 960,000 residents and residences.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\u201cAnyone who has received a DOF letter is encouraged to inquire or appeal if they believe their property meets the criteria for an exemption,\u201d a department spokesperson said Tuesday, pointing owners to the agency\u2019s website.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Andy Arons, who has lived in the same West Village brownstone with his family for the last 27 years, characterized the tone of the notice he received as \u201cdraconian.\u201d <\/p>\n

Forcing longtime residents to justify how long they\u2019ve lived in the city has echoes of more repressive regimes, Arons said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt feels like a command-and-control type government like Cuba or China. They say, and they are going to come and take it if you don\u2019t comply. There\u2019s a sort of unspoken threat,\u201d he told The Post. <\/p>\n

He said the whole episode feels \u201cperformative,\u201d or hopping on a trend with the intention of sowing division.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s moving money from people who earned it to people who don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ordinary New Yorkers are seething after receiving five-figure property tax bills under Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s new pied-\u00e0-terre tax scheme, which was explicitly sold as a levy targeting wealthy owners of multiple residences or swanky vacation homes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-metro"],"yoast_head":"\nExclusive | Longtime New Yorkers fume after being hit with massive pied-\u00e0-terre tax bills: 'Is this a witch hunt?' - Metro Transit Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=5607\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Exclusive | Longtime New Yorkers fume after being hit with massive pied-\u00e0-terre tax bills: 'Is this a witch hunt?' - 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