- New condo launches across Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens are projected to fall 11% through 2029, per Corcoran Sunshine’s 2026 Pipeline report, averaging just 13,000 units annually.
- Entry-level condo supply priced at $1,800 per square foot or less is set to plunge 74%, while Manhattan’s luxury pipeline holds nearly 3,000 units above $2,400 per square foot.
- Rentals will make up 78% of the roughly 52,000 units coming to market through 2029, far short of the 700,000 additional units Mamdani’s administration says the city needs.
New York City’s pipeline of new-construction condos for sale is set to shrink, with new condo launches projected to fall 11% through 2029, according to Corcoran Sunshine Marketing Group’s 2026 Pipeline report, as reported by Bloomberg. An average of 13,000 condo and rental units will come to market annually through 2029, down from a 13,400 average over the past decade. In total, about 52,000 combined market-rate condo and rental units are expected to launch across Manhattan and the studied areas of Brooklyn and Queens through the period.
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A Decade-Old Bottleneck
The pullback dates to 2019. A change to New York’s rent law effectively ended condo and co-op conversions of rental buildings.
Those conversions had long provided steady, relatively affordable for-sale supply. Manhattan developers have since brought fewer than 1,500 new for-sale units to market each year.
About 1,800 units typically sell annually. That supply gap has widened as interest rates and development costs remain elevated.
Recent rental-to-condo conversions have also been slow and litigation-prone. Even well-capitalized developers have struggled with the process. That has further discouraged owners from converting occupied rental buildings into for-sale properties.
The Details
Entry-level condo supply, priced at $1,800 per square foot or less, is projected to plunge 74%.
Manhattan has almost 3,000 luxury units in the pipeline priced at $2,400 per square foot or more. By comparison, only about 170 entry-level units are planned in core Manhattan.
That’s roughly a 17-to-1 gap between the top and bottom of the for-sale market.
Rentals will account for about 78% of the 52,000 units in the pipeline. Nearly 13,000 of those units will come from office-to-residential conversions in core Manhattan.
That means much of the recent “new supply” is rental housing rather than homes for buyers.
“These numbers are definitely low and definitely below what we think the market could support or certainly what it needs,” said Ryan Schleis, Corcoran Sunshine’s SVP of research and analytics.
Zooming Out
The imbalance mirrors multifamily construction data. Developers have also scaled back new projects.
The trend comes as Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration estimates the city needs 700,000 additional housing units over the next decade. That’s about 70,000 units per year across all income levels.
The target sits far above the pipeline’s current construction pace.
Why It Matters
About two-thirds of New York households rent. Developers are therefore increasingly favoring rental construction for its steadier cash flow.
Tax-abatement programs also tend to favor rentals over ownership housing. That is squeezing options for buyers seeking homes under $3 million.
The pressure adds to affordability concerns already visible in NYC rent burden data.
For developers, the math increasingly favors rentals. They offer steadier cash flow and fewer entitlement fights over rent stabilization. Financing is also easier to underwrite than a for-sale project exposed to swings in buyer demand.
“There’s always people that need to rent in New York. There’s definitely never enough rental housing,” Schleis said. He added that buyers under $3 million will likely face fewer opportunities.
What’s Next
Without a return to rental-to-condo conversions or new incentives for entry-level for-sale housing, the supply gap will likely keep widening through 2029.
That could push more buyers into an already tight rental market.
Watch how the Mamdani administration’s housing agenda addresses the imbalance. A push to revive conversion pathways or expand tax incentives for for-sale construction could help.
The bigger question is whether policymakers can shift a pipeline increasingly dominated by rentals and luxury homes.
