Mayor Zohran Mamdani will announce a city-backed insurance program Thursday aimed at cutting costs for owners of rent-stabilized and subsidized buildings across all five boroughs.

The privately run program, set to launch in 2027, will initially cover property and liability insurance for buildings containing 20,000 apartments. By 2030, the city expects that number to reach 100,000 apartments. The program will draw on an as-yet-undisclosed amount of taxpayer funds, according to the administration.

Mamdani plans to unveil the effort at the Citizens Housing and Planning Council’s annual luncheon Thursday afternoon.

Deputy Mayor for Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg said insurance premiums for subsidized housing in New York City have surged far beyond what the risk picture warrants. “The risk profile of projects hasn’t gone up threefold since 2018, but the costs have,” Bozorg said on a briefing call Wednesday. “We’re not trying to replace the entire insurance market. We want to create a program that can compete in it by operating much more efficiently.”

Premiums doubled in four years for subsidized housing owned by community development corporations and nonprofit entities, according to multiple reports. A separate analysis found insurance costs more than doubled over a six-year period. Those figures have pushed housing operators to the edge, eating into budgets that would otherwise go toward building maintenance and services.

The spike isn’t a New York problem alone. Nationally, rising insurance rates tied to climate-driven disasters, increased reinsurance costs, and inflation have hammered landlords and homeowners alike, threatening the financial viability of affordable housing stock from coast to coast.

Bozorg said she expects the program to bring insurance costs down 20% to 30% for participating landlords, freeing up capital that could be reinvested in their buildings. She said savings could also allow the city to stretch its own capital funds further across the affordable housing portfolio.

It’s not a bailout for bad actors. Bozorg was clear that the program won’t function as an insurer of last resort. Landlords will have to apply and meet eligibility criteria, though the specific thresholds haven’t been set yet.

That structure sets New York’s approach apart from state-created insurance programs in Florida, where a government entity stepped in to cover property owners who couldn’t get policies anywhere else. New York’s program is privately managed and designed to compete with existing insurers on efficiency, not simply absorb risks the market won’t touch.

The announcement fits squarely into Mamdani’s broader push to lower rents and stabilize the city’s housing supply. His administration has framed rising operating costs, including insurance, as a major pressure point that drives rent increases even in regulated buildings. Landlords in the rent-stabilized sector have repeatedly cited insurance costs in filings before the Rent Guidelines Board, where the question of allowable rent increases gets decided each year.

The Citizens Housing and Planning Council has long tracked affordability pressures on the subsidized housing sector. Its annual luncheon draws developers, nonprofit operators, city officials, and advocates who work in the affordable housing space, making it a deliberate venue for a rollout like this.

The details still pending are substantial. City officials haven’t disclosed the total public commitment or named the private entity that will manage the program. They haven’t finalized eligibility criteria. And the 2027 launch date leaves a full year of implementation work ahead before any landlord sees a policy.

Real dollars are at stake. For a nonprofit housing operator running a portfolio of 500 units, a 25% drop in insurance premiums can mean hundreds of thousands of dollars returned to operations annually. Scaled to 100,000 apartments by 2030, the aggregate savings across New York’s subsidized housing sector could reshape budget math for community land trusts, housing development fund corporations, and mission-driven landlords who have been squeezed hard by the insurance market.

Bozorg said those operators deserve a competitive option. The administration’s bet is that a city-backed program, running leaner than commercial carriers, can deliver it. Whether the private manager chosen to run it can execute at that scale is the question officials didn’t fully answer Wednesday.

The Rent Guidelines Board’s preliminary vote on 2026 increases is expected later this spring.