New York City apartment occupancy limits start with a single formula: one person for every 80 square feet of livable floor area. That rule comes from Section 27-2075 of the Housing Maintenance Code and sets the outer ceiling on how many people can legally live in your unit.1NYC.gov. Housing Maintenance Code – Section 27-2075 Maximum Permitted Occupancy Layered on top are rules about room size, sleeping arrangements, a state law that lets you add a roommate regardless of what your lease says, and federal fair housing protections that stop landlords from setting the number artificially low to keep families with children out.
How to Calculate Your Apartment’s Maximum Occupancy
Measure the total livable floor area, then divide by 80. Kitchens and kitchenettes count as livable area. Private halls, foyers, bathrooms, and water closet compartments do not.1NYC.gov. Housing Maintenance Code – Section 27-2075 Maximum Permitted Occupancy Leftover square footage below 80 doesn’t buy you another person; the math rounds down.
A worked example makes this concrete. A 500-square-foot apartment with a 40-square-foot bathroom and a 20-square-foot hallway has 440 square feet of livable area. Divide by 80 and you get five, so five people can legally occupy it. Shrink the same layout to 400 total square feet and the livable area drops to 340, which supports four.
Young children get an extra allowance. For every two people legally occupying the apartment, one child under four can also live there without counting against the limit. A solo occupant gets the same allowance, so a studio sized for one adult can also house one child under four.2NYC.gov. NYC Administrative Code – Section 27-2075 Maximum Permitted Occupancy
Room Size and Sleeping Limits
The Multiple Dwelling Law adds a second set of rules focused on individual rooms. In Class A multiple dwellings built after April 18, 1929, at least one living room in every apartment must be 132 square feet or larger. Every additional living room needs at least 80 square feet with a minimum horizontal dimension of eight feet.3NYC.gov. New York State Multiple Dwelling Law – Section 31 Size of Rooms
Sleeping arrangements have their own cap. No single room may be used for sleeping by more than two adults. Under this rule, anyone 12 or older counts as an adult, two children between 2 and 11 count as one adult, and children under two don’t count at all. Each room also needs 400 cubic feet of air per adult and 200 cubic feet per child.3NYC.gov. New York State Multiple Dwelling Law – Section 31 Size of Rooms In a room with standard eight-foot ceilings, 400 cubic feet works out to 50 square feet of floor space per adult, but the 80-square-foot rule from the Housing Maintenance Code is almost always the binding number.
Your Right to Add a Roommate
Even if your lease names only you, state law gives you room to share. Real Property Law Section 235-f, known as the Roommate Law, reads every lease for a single tenant to permit occupancy by the tenant, the tenant’s immediate family, one additional occupant, and that occupant’s dependent children. You or your spouse must keep the apartment as a primary residence.4New York State Senate. New York Real Property Law 235-F
Leases with two or more named tenants work differently. The total count of tenants and occupants, not including dependent children of the occupants, can’t exceed the number of tenants on the current lease. A lease with three named tenants allows three occupants total, plus each occupant’s dependent children, as long as at least one tenant or spouse lives there as a primary residence.4New York State Senate. New York Real Property Law 235-F
A landlord can still enforce a legitimate overcrowding limit, meaning the Housing Maintenance Code and Multiple Dwelling Law numbers above. What a landlord cannot do is confine occupancy to only the person who signed the lease.5New York State Attorney General. Residential Tenants’ Rights Guide Note one important limit: if the named tenant moves out, the roommate has no independent right to stay unless separate protections apply, such as rent-stabilized succession rights.
Co-op buildings often layer their own rules on top of the Roommate Law, requiring board approval for new occupants or long-term guests. Courts have generally upheld those requirements where the proprietary lease and bylaws address occupancy directly.
When a Landlord’s Limit Is Too Low
Some landlords set lease-based occupancy limits well below what the Housing Maintenance Code actually allows. Federal fair housing law pushes back on that. The Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination based on familial status, and HUD guidance based on a 1991 memorandum and formalized in a 1998 notice treats two people per bedroom as generally reasonable.6Department of Housing and Urban Development. Fair Housing Enforcement – Occupancy Standards Notice of Statement of Policy
Two per bedroom is a baseline, not a ceiling. HUD also weighs total unit size, bedroom dimensions, and building configuration. A landlord restricting a large two-bedroom to two total occupants would draw scrutiny; one allowing four in the same unit likely would not. Policies that cap the number of children specifically, rather than total occupants, are especially likely to be found discriminatory.6Department of Housing and Urban Development. Fair Housing Enforcement – Occupancy Standards Notice of Statement of Policy If a landlord’s number sits below both the Housing Maintenance Code formula and the HUD guideline, a tenant with children may have grounds for a discrimination complaint.
Live-In Aides and Disability Accommodations
Both the Fair Housing Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act require reasonable accommodations for disabilities, and that can override an otherwise applicable occupancy limit. The most common example is a live-in aide. When a tenant or family member has a disability that requires in-home supportive services, the landlord generally must permit the aide to live in the unit even if that pushes the household above the lease limit.7eCFR. 24 CFR 982.316 – Live-in Aide Put the request in writing and be ready to document the need. A landlord who refuses without engaging in the required interactive process risks a discrimination complaint.
Short-Term Rentals Are a Separate Rulebook
If you’re renting your apartment out for fewer than 30 consecutive days, the Housing Maintenance Code numbers above are not what governs. Local Law 18 of 2022 requires registration with the Mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement, and booking platforms cannot process transactions for unregistered listings. Even registered hosts must be physically present during the stay, guests cannot have exclusive access to any locked room, and no more than two paying guests are allowed at a time.8NYC Rules. Registration and Requirements for Short-Term Rentals
What Happens If You Exceed the Limit
Enforcement usually starts with a 311 complaint from a tenant, neighbor, or landlord. The Department of Housing Preservation and Development handles maintenance code overcrowding complaints; the Department of Buildings handles illegal conversions and unpermitted construction. Inspectors can arrive without advance notice, and violations come with deadlines to correct the problem.
The dollar amounts vary by code. Non-hazardous Housing Maintenance Code violations run $10 to $50. Hazardous violations run $25 to $100 plus $10 per day until corrected. Immediately hazardous violations in buildings with five or fewer units cost $50 per day; in larger buildings they run $50 to $150 per violation plus $125 per day.9NYC.gov. Housing Maintenance Code – Section 27-2115 Imposition of Civil Penalty Illegal conversions, where an apartment has been altered to house more families than legally authorized, are treated far more seriously. The city also notifies the IRS, the state Department of Taxation, and the city Department of Finance when it finds them.10NYC Administrative Code. Article 210 – Illegal Conversions Immediately hazardous building code violations carry civil penalties starting at $1,000 and reaching $25,000 per violation.11Local Laws of the City of New York. Local Law 94 of 2017 – Section 28-202.1 Civil Penalties
There’s private exposure too. A homeowner’s insurance policy may deny or reduce coverage for a loss tied to an illegal apartment or unpermitted modification, so a fire in an unauthorized bedroom carved out of a living room can leave the owner uninsured. Landlords who collect rent on illegal units under a standard residential mortgage also risk triggering an acceleration clause if the lender finds out.
One thing a landlord cannot do, even when a real occupancy violation exists, is remove anyone without a court judgment. Self-help eviction is a Class A misdemeanor under the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019.12New York State Attorney General. Unlawful Evictions – RPAPL Section 768 If you’re a tenant facing pressure to leave over an alleged occupancy issue, the landlord still has to go through housing court.