New York’s Zillow ZHVI typical home value is $823,251 and its ZORI typical observed market rent is $4,133 a month. That pairing implies a 6.03% gross yield before every operating cost, financing, vacancy, taxes, insurance and capital work. Affordability is tight against the ACS household benchmark: price is 10.23x median household income, while annual ZORI equals 61.63% of that income. These are citywide screening metrics, not a property cash-flow estimate.
The city is renter-majority, with 67.22% of occupied units renter-occupied and a 9.36% citywide vacancy rate. ACS reports a $777,600 median value for surveyed owner-occupied homes and $1,821 median gross rent for occupied rentals, including selected utilities. Those ACS measures differ in coverage and period from Zillow’s typical home value and observed market rent, so they should not be blended. Tenure and vacancy describe the citywide stock; neither establishes lease-up conditions for a particular unit.
Direct city structure data show 48.90% of all units in large multifamily structures and 16.26% in single-family structures. Among vacant units, 24.72% are classified as for rent, a reason share rather than available investment inventory. The city’s reported rent-burden share is 52.41%. Population across the overlapping ACS vintages rose 0.77%, which is not annualized and may reflect boundary changes. Median household income is $80,483; poverty is 17.91% and unemployment 8.04%. Together these describe demand constraints, but cannot prove tenant quality, achievable property rent, or leasing speed.
At the county scope, property-tax rates are 1.03% in Bronx County, 0.71% in Kings County, 0.92% in New York County, 0.87% in Queens County and 0.93% in Richmond County; each is separate context, not a city rate. In the broader New York, NY metro, employment changed 0.06% year over year and building permits totaled 58,152, evidence with different denominators from city housing measures. Nationally, the Freddie Mac 30-year mortgage rate is 6.58%, a financing backdrop rather than a city market metric.
Underwriting should therefore avoid treating the city yield as net return or assuming the citywide renter base guarantees occupancy. The key missing items are address-level rent comparables, unit condition, building age and systems, taxes for the actual parcel, insurance quotes, flood and other hazard review, legal rent or use restrictions, association or common charges, utilities, maintenance, management, turnover, capital reserves and financing terms. Verify title, liens, permits, certificate of occupancy, tenant files and current leases, then run property-specific vacancy, expense and debt-service stresses before deciding.