New York City apartment owners will get tax break renewed

NEW YORK, July 5 (Reuters) - New York City residents who own cooperative and condominium apartments will get the benefit of a property tax break replacing one that had expired under an accord between the state legislature and the governor.

"We have reached an agreement on landmark legislation that will cut taxes for the vast majority of condo and co-op owners who pay a disproportionate share of the city's property tax burden," said Michael Whyland, a spokesman for Democratic Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver in a written statement.

The previous property tax break expired on June 30. The new lower rates are expected to be retroactive to July 1, Whyland said, but apartment owners initially will be billed at the higher rates.

"In the short term, the city has issued tax bills for the current fiscal year based on the current tax abatement rates," he added.

Spokesmen for Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo and Republican Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos were not immediately available to comment on the agreement.

According to a copy of the Assembly bill, the property tax relief will be phased out over three fiscal years starting on June 30, 2012 for individuals whose apartments are not their primary residences. For all the other owners, the new tax break will be in place until June 30, 2015.

The Democratic-led Assembly and the Republican-controlled Senate are expected to return to Albany sometime after the November elections, when they will enact the property tax law.

In New York state government, the agreements reached by the three most powerful politicians - the governor, the speaker and the senate majority leader - typically are enacted. The November elections are not expected to change which party remains the majority in both houses of the legislature.

In May, New York City's Independent Budget Office estimated that the city would collect an extra $445 million of revenue from 365,000 apartment owners if the tax break was allowed to expire.