Albany’s Vacant Buildings - a 2025 Update

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“The total number of vacant buildings at the end of 2025 numbered 798, which represents the lowest number of vacant buildings since the beginning of this reporting, and the lowest number of vacant buildings… dating back to 2017. The decrease … likely has multiple factors, including the increase in enforcement efforts taken by the City since 2017 and continually rising real estate values dating back to 2020.”

      - City of Albany 2025 Vacant Building Registry Report

Can we get the red X buildings back in use as residences?  One can hear this, or similar, refrains in many discussions about housing in the City of Albany.  As with many issues, the reality is more complicated than a reconstruction problem.  Moving vacant buildings from red X status to occupied status can transcend issues such as ownership and owner rights, delinquent taxes, auction processes and more.  We write about the City’s vacant buildings to help inform the conversation. 

In early 2025 we analyzed the City of Albany’s vacant building data, using a vacant building list that is maintained by the City, vintage June 2023.  Two years have passed and our goal is to update this analysis with recent vacant building data.  In addition, as we have been exploring Albany’s crime data we examined the intersection of crime and vacant buildings. 

What we came up with is a two parter - this data story examines the City’s vacant buildings using recent data; part two examines the intersection of crime and vacant buildings on several levels, by block and by neighborhood.

Note - if you are reading this prior to 10/14/26, the City of Albany is hosting a Neighborhood Academy session on vacant buildings on October 14th, more details here.

The City of Albany’s Department of Neighborhood & Community Services recently (August 2026) released an update to the Vacant Building Registry Report.  The report consists of a vacant building spreadsheet and a pdf containing both narrative and data analysis.  We have placed copies of both files in this Google Drive folder.

The data (image below) is straightforward.  Each vacant property is listed by parcel, address, type of building, delinquent taxes (if any) and owner (typically individuals, LLCs, government agencies or banks)

The delinquent property report, 2025 Vacant Building Registry Report.pdf, is a very detailed and mostly accessible report.  The report details the various dimensions and challenges of managing the vacant building program, including auctions, zombie lawsuites, the courts and code enforcement and much more. 

Using the 2023 vacant building data and comparing against the 2025 data we can understand the movement of buildings on and off the list.  We had a mental picture of vacant buildings - that buildings get added to the vacant building list and then stay on the list.  This is not the case.

The 2023 vacant building list had 921 properties; the 2025 list contains 799 properties.  Between these lists 1,222 unique properties showed up on one or more lists:

• 497 properties showed up on the 2023 and 2025 lists
• 301 properties are new to the 2025 list
• 424 properties were on the 2023 list but not the 2025 list

The dynamic nature of the vacant building list was very surprising and we can visualize this with a map.  In the map below properties that are on the 2025 vacant building list are red dots; the 2023 vacant building list is larger green dots.  Properties on both 2023 and 2025 lists have a red dot superimposed on a green dot.

The numbers are relatively unchanged from 2023.  

• Albany County and its entities own 64 vacant properties, 8% of all properties, a slight increase from 2023.
• There are fewer than twenty land owners that own 3 or more properties on the vacant building list.  
• At least one family, through several distinct names, all at the same owner address, owns 9 vacant properties
• There are 3 vacant properties owned by one member of the City’s Common Council (we are observing this as a fact and not a criticism)
• Over 300 of the properties have owner addresses outside of Albany, NY

The vacant building registry narrative report (shared in our Google Drive folder) is a dense document with a lot of detail on the movement and prosecution of vacant buildings.  Pages two to five thoroughly describe the examination and execution of the auction process and potential operational improvements.  

We can highlight three sections in the report that interested us:

We set out to understand the changes in vacant building remediation between 2023 and 2025.  We were impressed with the progress and by the reporting on the City’s vacant buildings from the Department of Neighborhood & Community Services.  We also came away with four concluding thoughts:

1. What is our goal?  What would success look like?  With the progress that the City is making in reducing vacant buildings and improving the operations to address code and vacancy issues, what would be a great end state?  If we get below 500 vacant properties is that success?  If we can halve the time that it takes to address code issues, would that represent success?
2. The number of vacant properties is decreasing at a material rate.  Are there additional investments that we (the City) can make that would accelerate this decrease, and would these investments provide a return on our City’s investment?  We're using the word "investment" not only to mean a budgetary investment but also an attention and time investment.
3. The vacant property list is highly volatile with properties coming on and off the list at a surprising rate.  This merits investigation - what are the root causes of properties coming onto the list?  And, if we have an awareness of these themes or causes is there anything that the City can do to interdict these properties before they come onto the list?  
4. The count of emergency actions is significant and comes with a cost to the City and its taxpayers.  Are there different approaches that the City can take regarding emergency actions?  

Have any thoughts, comments or criticisms of our work?  Post a reply on any of our social media or drop us an email at AlbanyDataStories@gmail.com.

Article originally published 9/28/2026