MHANY Management, Inc. is a nonprofit housing management organization in New York City that grew out of the now-defunct left-of-center ACORN network’s organizing among squatters in the 1980s. It is the successor organization to Mutual Housing Association of New York, Inc. (MHANY), which was created by ACORN. ^{1 2}  

MHANY Management owns and manages more than 2,000 rental units in New York City and is also active in New Jersey. ³

Organizational Structure

The Mutual Housing Association of New York network of nonprofits was created in 1987, after left-of-center organizing network ACORN pressured elected officials in New York City into transferring title in 58 city-owned and squatter-occupied buildings to the organization. ¹ According to ACORN co-founder Wade Rathke, MHANY was created after then-Mayor Ed Koch (D-NY) “in a pique refused to let us [ACORN] take control of them [the housing projects] through anything with the ACORN name attached, so we moved forward under the moniker of the Mutual Housing Association of New York (MHANY) on the development side.” ⁴

MHANY Management was created in 1996 and has been the lead organization in the complex MHANY network of nonprofit and for-profit corporations since roughly 2016. ⁵

It frequently functions as a real estate developer, managing the development of various real estate projects that incorporate components of low-income housing through a network of nonprofit and for-profit development companies it controls. ⁶ In MHANY Management’s 2023 annual tax filings, it reported that it controls 15 nonprofit development corporations, is a partner in 13 taxable development partnerships, and has an interest in 18 different taxable corporations. ⁵

Many of these subsidiaries and partnerships have significant revenues, expenses, and assets that are not reported on MHANY Management’s tax filings. For example, the MHANY Stella Heights Housing Development Fund Corporation created alongside a MHANY Stella Heights LLC for-profit development corporation to develop 83 units of low-income housing in New York City reported $608,935 in revenues, $2,215,704 in expenses and no assets in its 2023 IRS filings. ^{7 8}

Funders

In addition to receiving property management revenues and grants from nonprofit organizations and corporate funders, MHANY Management and its associated nonprofits and development corporations also receive funding from federal, state, and local government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Fannie Mae, and New York State’s Division of Housing and Community Renewal and Energy Research and Development Authority. ⁹

In May 2025, the New York City Council announced a major rezoning plan for Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, allowing for mixed-use residential and commercial development in what had been a predominantly industrial area. ^{10 11} MHANY is one of four nonprofit organizations that will split $9.85 million in government funding over three years to offer “services and support” for existing residents in the rezoned area. ¹⁰

Controversies

Evictions

In 2020, the New York Daily News published an investigative report detailing MHANY Management’s filing eviction proceedings against roughly 2,000 tenants over a decade, for amounts as low as $1,220 in back rent. ¹²

Daily News reporter Michael Gartland noted that MHANY was connected to and had received funding from the New York Communities Organizing Fund (NYCOFI) and New York Communities for Change (NYCC), which advocate policies that would make it harder for landlords to evict tenants for nonpayment of rent. ¹² Like MHANY, NYCOFI and NYCC are also successors to ACORN’s New York City operations, with NYCC being founded by former New York ACORN staffers and initially working from ACORN’s former Brooklyn offices. ^{13 14 15 16}  

The report also detailed issues with MHANY-managed housing according to city records, including structural collapses, lack of heating or hot water, and vermin infestations. ¹²

Atlantic Yards

In 2003, ACORN and MHANY supported the approval of developer Steven Ratner’s controversial $6 billion Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn. The project, which was centered on the Barclays Center basketball and hockey arena, was initially presented as offering 40 percent of the planned residential construction to low-income housing and 20 percent to moderate-income units. In 2005, ACORN signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Ratner that committed the developer to constructing 2,250 affordable units. ¹⁷

However, the project scope changed multiple times over the following decades, and the promised affordable housing was not constructed in accordance with the initial scope. In 2014, a majority stake in the project was purchased by Greenland USA, a subsidiary of the People’s Republic of China-based Greenland Group real estate investment firm, which renamed the project Pacific Park. ¹⁸

In 2017, the nonprofit NYC real estate site City Limits reported that MHANY was managing “affordable” housing units with rents between $2,137 and $3,223 per month, for households with incomes up to $173,415 per year. ¹⁹

In 2022, journalist and community activist Norman Oder published a detailed breakdown of MHANY’s portfolio of properties in Pacific Park, reporting that “low-income” had shifted from 40 percent to 60 percent of the area median income (AMI), with “middle-income” rising to 165 percent of AMI, and that only 1,374 of the promised 2,250 units had been built. ²⁰

Oder also criticized ACORN and MHANY for not holding the developers to the terms of the original Community Benefits Agreement, especially for failing to hire an independent compliance monitor as the original agreement promised. ²¹

1. Erlanger, Steven. “New York Turns Squatters into Homeowners.” The New York Times, October 12, 1987. https://www.nytimes.com/1987/10/12/nyregion/new-york-turns-squatters-into-homeowners.html.
2. “History.” MHANY Management. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://www.mutualhousingny.org/history.
3. “Properties.” MHANY Management. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://www.mutualhousingny.org/rental-properties-1.
4. Rathke, Wade. “Brooklyn’s Atlantic Yards and ACORN.” The Chief Organizer Blog, February 2, 2023. https://chieforganizer.org/2023/02/02/brooklyns-atlantic-yards-and-acorn/.
5. “MHANY Management Inc.” ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/721303737.
6. “NYCEDC Allocates Mutual Housing Association of New York $18M to Construct Industrial Center in the South Bronx.” The Office of The Bronx Borough President | Vanessa L. Gibson. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://bronxboropres.nyc.gov/2019/06/12/nycedc-allocates-mutual-housing-association-of-new-york-18m-to-construct-industrial-center-in-the-south-bronx/.
7. “MHANY Stella Heights Housing Development Fund Corporation, Full Filing.” ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/842668403/202423179349302747/full.
8. “Mhany in Financing of Stella Heights Project.” Cleary Gottlieb, February 6, 2024. https://www.clearygottlieb.com/news-and-insights/news-listing/mhany-in-financing-of-stella-heights-project.
9. “Funders.” MHANY Management. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://www.mutualhousingny.org/funders-1.
10. “NYC Council Land Use Committees Vote to Approve Atlantic Avenue Mixed Use Plan That Will Deliver 4,600 Units of Housing and Crucial Community Investments.” New York City Council, May 12, 2025. https://council.nyc.gov/press/2025/05/12/2865/.
11. Bradley-Smith, Anna. “Sweeping Atlantic Avenue Rezoning Plan Moves Forward.” Brownstoner, March 25, 2025. https://www.brownstoner.com/development/atlantic-avenue-rezoning-cpc-vote/.
12. Gartland, Michael. “Anti-Eviction Ally Responsible for Starting Hundreds of NYC Eviction Cases.” New York Daily News, January 18, 2020. https://www.nydailynews.com/2020/01/19/anti-eviction-ally-responsible-for-starting-hundreds-of-nyc-eviction-cases/.
13. Scanlon, Terrence. “SCANLON: The Other IRS Scandal.” The Washington Times. The Washington Times, August 22, 2013. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/aug/22/scanlon-the-other-irs-scandal/.
14. Cooke, Charles C. W. “Acorn Is up to Its Old Tricks.” National Review, July 29, 2020. https://www.nationalreview.com/2012/02/acorn-its-old-tricks-charles-c-w-cooke/.
15. “Acorn Local Chapters Declare Independence; Makeover Appears Cosmetic.” National Legal Policy Center, February 23, 2010. https://archive.nlpc.org/2010/02/23/acorn-local-chapters-declare-independence-makover-appears-cosmetic/.
16. “About.” New York Communities for Change. Accessed May 15, 2025. https://www.nycommunities.org/about.
17. “Atlantic Yards Affordable Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) Forest City Ratner New York Acorn, May 17, 2005.” DocumentCloud. Accessed May 19, 2025. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6777687-Atlantic-Yards-Housing-MOU/.
18. Cuozzo, Steve. “Forest City to Sell All but 5% of Pacific Park to Greenland USA.” New York Post, January 15, 2018. https://nypost.com/2018/01/14/bruce-ratner-to-sell-all-but-5-percent-of-his-firms-share-of-pacific-park/.
19. Murphy, Jarrett. “Atlantic Yards Developers Struggle to Find Tenants for Higher-Income Affordable Units.” City Limits, November 6, 2017. https://citylimits.org/atlantic-yards-developers-struggle-to-find-tenants-for-higher-income-affordable-units/.
20. Oder, Norman. “As Mhany Markets ‘Affordable’ Middle-Income Units at Plank Road & Brooklyn Crossing, a Disconnect with Core Constituency of Low- and Moderate-Income People.” Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report, March 15, 2022. https://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2022/03/as-mhany-markets-affordable-middle.html.
21. Oder, Norman. “The Atlantic Yards Independent Compliance Monitor Was Never Hired.”  Learning from Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, February 20, 2025. https://normanoder.substack.com/p/the-atlantic-yards-independent-compliance.