Zohran Mamdani’s capitalist plan to fix the housing crisis | CNN Business

Real estate developers spent millions to stop Zohran Mamdani from becoming New York City’s mayor, claiming his policies would destroy the city. Mamdani was elected on a platform of rent freezes and government-backed housing, proposing a $100 billion plan during the campaign to create a Vienna-style social housing model. But his new $22 billion plan to get New York City out of its housing crisis relies on developers. His strategy uses market-oriented policies — easing building regulations, loosening zoning restrictions and rescuing the city’s crumbling public housing stock through private financing — to advance his social democratic goals of 200,000 affordable homes over the next decade. Mamdani changed his mind about the “role of the private market in housing construction” late in his campaign, and he again detailed his political evolution in an announcement speech last week. Successes in Austin, Minneapolis and Seattle proved that loosening zoning laws and other regulations are necessary to add housing and bring down rents, he said. His evolution shows the tensions between political ideology and the challenges of building housing. Developing new housing in the United S