The New York City Public Advocate publishes the Worst Landlord Watchlist every year, and you can search it by address, landlord name or borough at the Public Advocate's Worst Landlord Watchlist. The site is run by the Public Advocate's office and pulls directly from city violation data, so it is the only place to check this specific list. Being off the list does not clear a landlord, since it only ranks the 100 worst portfolios citywide plus the ten worst buildings in each borough.
What the Worst Landlord Watchlist Measures
The Watchlist ranks landlords by the average number of open Housing Maintenance Code violations across their buildings, using Department of Housing Preservation and Development data. Only the more serious violations count: Class B, for hazardous conditions such as a missing self-closing door or a failure to clear vermin, and Class C, for immediately hazardous conditions such as rodents, lead paint, or no heat, hot water, electricity or gas. Class C violations are weighted more heavily than Class B in the score.
HPD tallies each building's open B and C violations for every month in a twelve-month window, averages the twelve counts, then divides by the number of units. A building has to clear a threshold to qualify: a score of 3 or higher for buildings under 35 units, or 2 or higher for buildings with 35 units or more. It also needs at least one open violation per unit in the final month of the data period. Buildings that clear the threshold are grouped by the name of the "head officer" or individual owner as registered with HPD, and that grouping is what produces each landlord's ranking. The current edition covers violations open at any point between November 2024 and October 2025.
The Watchlist entry for a landlord also pulls in information beyond HPD violations, though this part does not affect the ranking itself. It shows Department of Buildings violation counts for the same buildings, notes whether any of them had unpaid debt sold through the city's annual tax lien sale, and lists evictions the Department of Investigation recorded from city marshals since December 2020. Reading all three alongside the violation count gives a fuller picture of one landlord's buildings than the HPD score alone.
Searching the Watchlist
Go to the Watchlist site and use the Landlords, Buildings or Map pages to search by name, address or borough. If your landlord's name matches a listed head officer, the entry shows every building tied to that name that met the selection criteria, with each building's average violation count. If you only have a building address, the Buildings search works the same way without needing the owner's name first.
Two results are common and neither means what people assume. A landlord who owns dozens of buildings but keeps violations low everywhere will not appear, even with a large portfolio. A landlord with one small building that racked up violations can appear even with no other properties, since the top ten per borough are ranked independent of ownership size. Cross-check any address against the Building Health X building lookup as well, since it shows the same underlying HPD violations directly, without needing the building to clear the Watchlist's separate threshold.
Watchlist Publication Schedule
The Public Advocate releases a new edition once a year, typically in January. The current edition, covering the twelve months from November 2024 through October 2025, was released January 21, 2026, the seventh annual release since the Watchlist began. That detail matters less for any one name than for what it shows about the ranking itself: it groups violations under whichever individual is registered as head officer, so a company that spreads ownership across several named officers can still show up more than once near the top.
Landlords Outside the Top 100
The Watchlist is a narrow slice of HPD's enforcement activity. Three other programs catch buildings the Watchlist's 100-landlord, 10-buildings-per-borough limit leaves out.
Alternative Enforcement Program
The Alternative Enforcement Program targets individual buildings with heavy violation counts and emergency repair charges, regardless of the owner's other properties. Selected buildings get more frequent HPD inspections, and if the owner does not correct violations, HPD can make the repairs itself and bill the owner, with the cost becoming a lien on the property.
Certification Watchlist
HPD selects 100 Class A multiple dwellings for the Certification Watchlist on or about January 15 each year, starting in 2025, under Local Law 71 of 2023. A building qualifies if more than 20 of its hazardous or immediately hazardous violations were certified as corrected in the prior calendar year and at least four of those certifications turned out to be false on reinspection, other than pest violations, which are excluded from this particular count. Once on the list, the owner cannot get certain violations closed by self-certifying alone; HPD requires at least two reinspections that year instead.
Heat Sensors Program
Under Local Law 18 of 2020, as amended by Local Law 70 of 2023, HPD selects 50 buildings a year with a pattern of heat complaints and installs internet-connected temperature sensors in every unit. HPD inspects the data at least twice a month between October 1 and January 31, and a building stays in the program for four years. It is a narrower list than the Worst Landlord Watchlist, built entirely from heat complaint patterns rather than overall violation counts.
Checking Complaints Directly
None of these lists catch every problem building, since all of them depend on violations HPD has already issued, and HPD only issues a violation after an inspection confirms a complaint. If you want the fullest picture of one building rather than whether it made a citywide list, look up its open and closed violations directly and file a 311 complaint yourself if something in your own unit needs an inspection. A building with a thin violation history because few tenants ever called 311 is not the same as a well-maintained building.
Rehabilitation Exclusions From the Watchlist
The Public Advocate's office excludes some buildings from the Watchlist even when their violation counts would otherwise qualify. A building loses its spot if it received government financing for a rehabilitation project within the past two years, or if it is in the city's 7A program with a court-appointed administrator in place. Other buildings under repair but outside a city-sponsored program can also be pulled after a case-by-case review that looks at the building's occupancy history, tax arrears, harassment complaints and a visual inspection. The Watchlist notes that it makes no distinction between occupied and vacant buildings otherwise, so a vacant building with high violation counts still appears unless it qualifies for one of these specific exclusions.
Responding to a Listed Landlord
Finding your landlord on the Watchlist does not fix anything by itself. Keep a dated record of every condition in your own apartment, since the Watchlist's score is built from your building's official violation count, and an unreported problem never becomes a violation. Call 311 for anything HPD has not already logged, and consider organizing with neighbors, since a landlord with dozens of open violations across a building usually has more than one apartment affected. The Community Service Society's guide to tenant rights and protections covers how to document conditions and where to get help if repairs do not follow. If a landlord on the Watchlist still will not fix a condition you have already reported, an HP action in Housing Court forces the issue in front of a judge.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does the Worst Landlord Watchlist Include Every Landlord With Violations?
No. It only includes the 100 landlords with the highest average open violations citywide, plus the ten worst-scoring buildings in each borough regardless of ownership. A landlord with real violation problems, spread across a portfolio that stays just under the ranking threshold, can fall outside both groups and never appear on the published list at all.
How Often Is the Watchlist Updated?
The Public Advocate publishes a new edition once a year, typically in January, using twelve months of HPD violation data ending the previous October. There is no mid-year refresh, so a building's status on the current edition stays fixed until the next annual release, even as new violations get issued against it in the meantime.
What Counts as a Violation for the Ranking?
Only Class B, hazardous, and Class C, immediately hazardous, violations count toward a building's score, and Class C counts for more in the weighting than Class B. Class A, the least severe category, is not part of this particular ranking, though it still shows up on the building's own violation record and on the free building lookup.
Can a Building Be Removed From the Watchlist for Doing Repairs?
Not mid-year. Each edition is fixed to its twelve-month data window once published, so repairs made after that window closes will only affect the following year's edition, not the current one. The Public Advocate's office has said as much directly: a building's rank on the published edition does not change even after violations tied to it get closed.
Are Co-ops and Condos Included on the Watchlist?
Almost never. The Watchlist covers multi-family rental buildings with three or more units, and it only ranks a building once it clears a violation-per-unit threshold. Most co-ops and condominiums, along with rental buildings under three units, are excluded from the selection criteria entirely, regardless of how many violations they carry.
My Landlord Isn't on Any List. Does That Mean the Building Is Safe?
Not on its own. It means HPD has not recorded enough violations to trigger any of these four programs, which depends on tenants reporting problems in the first place. Pull the building's own violation and complaint history before you treat a clean list as a clean building.
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