Trump and Mamdani Discuss Plan for ‘Entire New Neighborhood’ in NYC as Housing Costs Soar

President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani met on Monday to discuss housing affordability and the planned Sunnyside Yard—a massive Queens redevelopment project that has been in discussion for decades.

While Trump was in New York to address the U.N. General Assembly, he stopped by Gracie Mansion, the historic Upper East Side official residence of the city's mayor.

The last time a sitting president visited Gracie Mansion was in 1981, when President Ronald Regan met with Mayor Ed Koch.

This is the third meeting between Trump and Mamdani since the mayor was sworn into office on Jan. 1, 2026. While speaking to the press after their meeting, the officials shared that their discussion focused on improving affordability for New Yorkers, especially as the cost of living continues to grow.

“Each day, millions of New Yorkers struggle to get by in a city where a decent life costs too much, where a future of possibility and prosperity feels forever just one paycheck out of reach, where dignity is not accorded to all but only afforded by some,” Mamdani said to the press.

“At a time where hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers are asking the questions of how they can afford this city, I appreciate the conversation that the president and I have had on the subject of how we can make it easier to afford life in this great city that we call our home.”

Among the solutions discussed in the meeting was the development of housing over the Sunnyside Yard train junction in Queens, a proposal Mamdani has championed as he seeks $21 billion in federal funding to jump-start the project.

“We’re speaking about 12,000 homes, 30,000 jobs, the prospect of an entire new neighborhood in a city where housing is the No. 1 cost,” Mamdani said about the development.

Trump added that he’s seen discussions about Sunnyside Yard for several decades, but he thinks Mamdani may “have a shot at doing it,” and he knows it will be a dual effort.

“It’s a very federal-oriented job. You’re going to need a lot of federal approvals and probably some federal money to do it,” Trump stated of the large task at hand. “But it’s always been a great location.”

The president went on to say that Sunnyside will have “at least a pretty substantial component” of low-income housing options to ensure affordability for New Yorkers.

Although Trump and Mamdani did not go into the specific timeline or process for this new neighborhood to come to fruition, they shared that they agreed to set up “a new level of that conversation” between the operations team at New York’s City Hall and the White House team.

Housing affordability in New York City has been a conversation for a long time, but New Yorkers have yet to see significant relief. In the second quarter of 2026, the median asking rent in New York City was $3,707, an increase of $164, or 4.6%, compared to the same quarter of 2025.

While the rental price for apartments with three or more bedrooms decreased slightly since last year, the price increase for apartments with zero to two bedrooms shows that more renters are competing for smaller, more affordable units.

Manhattan saw the sharpest increase, with median asking rent jumping 9% year over year. Brooklyn and Queens followed closely behind with 5.9% and 5.6% increases, respectively.

Young New Yorkers and recent college graduates feel this squeeze substantially. Based on rentals listed on Realtor.com® and Class of 2026 salary projections from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, we found that the median asking rent for a studio apartment in New York City would consume 38.2% of a computer science graduate’s pre-tax salary or 45.2% of a business graduate’s pre-tax salary.

To compare, the median asking rent for a studio apartment across the 50 largest U.S. metros would consume just 20.9% of the average national salary for a computer science graduate and 24.% for a business graduate.