NYCHA takes 470 days on average to make repairs in apartments, city data shows

New York City's biggest landlord has reached a new and unfortunate milestone with apartment repairs taking more than one year on average. 

City data shows that it takes the New York City Housing Authority about 470 days on average to make repairs, which is up from 370 days in 2024.

Noina Marrero said she has been complaining to NYCHA for years about flooding in her home at the Johnson Houses in East Harlem. 

"They don't wanna help you, but they want their rent. I feel like I'm being neglected. I'm just, I don't count for nothing," she said. 

Part of her apartment is filled with stacked-up boxes that were in her closet.

"Can't be in the closet because the water goes through the closet. It fills up the closet, so everything has to be up so it doesn't get wet," she said. 

Housing officials said in September that they fixed the leak and now they are working to expedite plastering and painting. But Marrero said she's waited long enough for the repairs and wants a transfer to another unit.  

Dan Green, the NYCHA executive vice president of property management operations, said the delay times keep going up because of paint work orders.

"Because of our HUD agreement we create a lot of different types of paint work orders for inspections, probably too much than we can sometimes fund," he said.

Deputy Mayor of Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg says NYCHA is improving its responses to heat, elevators, waste and pest problems.  

"You have to look at really specific areas, especially areas that impact quality of life. This is not to paint over the fact that there are immense challenges," she said.

Housing staff have been fielding complaints at NYCHA in Your Neighborhood forums this year. There are two more coming up, including one in Brooklyn in November.   

Bozorg says the Mamdani administration recently invested $10 million over the next two years into fighting mold and leaks in NYCHA homes.

Those are the kind of problems Marrero said she's been dealing with for years. 

She sued NYCHA back in 2023 after she said a piece of her water-damaged ceiling fell and hit her on the head.

"It was painful. I get headaches, I get back aches all the time. They don't care," she said. 

That case is still going on, and in a court filing in 2023, NYCHA's lawyers denied that they were responsible for any injuries.