Mayor Baraka Announces Wide-Ranging Response to Combat Corporate Purchase of Owner-Occupied Homes and their Conversion into Rentals

City of Newark

4 May, 2022

Newark, NJ – May 4, 2022 – Mayor Ras J. Baraka today announced a wide-ranging package of proposed measures to mitigate the effects of the purchase of owner-occupied homes by large-scale investors in a press conference at City Hall. The proposed initiatives are in addition to the Mayor’s numerous programs to increase homeownership, prevent evictions, avoid gentrification, and make housing in Newark more equitable.

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated this decade-long national trend in residential real estate which results in rapidly rising rents, decreased homeownership, reduced availability of affordable housing, renter displacement, and less stable communities.

Mayor Baraka praised “Who Owns Newark,” a research report authored by David D. Troutt, Distinguished Professor of Law; Director of the Rutgers Center on Law, Inequality and Metropolitan Equity (CLiME) and a member of the City’s Equitable Growth Advisory Commission for providing data and recommendations to inform the City’s response. The City will work with the Equitable Growth Advisory Commission to address issues raised by “Who Owns Newark.”

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Mayor Baraka Announces Wide-Ranging Response to Combat Corporate Purchase of Owner-Occupied Homes and their Conversion into Rentals