Boston hearing explores extending and expanding tenant protections for condo conversions

On Sept. 23, 2025, the Boston City Council Committee on Government Operations held a virtual hearing on Docket 07666, an ordinance to renew and expand the city’s condominium-conversion protections and related enforcement processes. The hearing, held by Zoom and streamed on boston.gov, brought city housing officials, tenant advocates and councilors together to discuss applying the ordinance to smaller buildings and improving early detection of conversions.

The proposal would extend the existing ordinance that otherwise expires this December and, under the city’s reading of the Affordable Homes Act, expand coverage to buildings with two or more units while keeping an exemption for owner-occupied buildings with fewer than four units. Karina Oliver Milchman, director of policy development and research in the Mayor’s Office of Housing, said expanding coverage to two- and three-family buildings would be the single most impactful change: "If we were to expand coverage from four-unit buildings to two-unit buildings in 2024 ... almost a 100% of tenants who are displaced due to conversion would be protected by the ordinance," she said, citing the administration’s analysis.

Why it matters: the existing local ordinance — adopted in 1999 and amended in 2021 — currently applies only to residential properties of four or more units (built before 1983, per state law) and includes tenant protections such as advance notice, lease-extension rights, relocation assistance and a right of first refusal. Under the proposed renewal and expansion, more tenants in neighborhoods such as Dorchester, Hyde Park, Mattapan, Roslindale, Roxbury and East Boston would become eligible for those protections.

Key provisions described at the hearing

- Coverage and timing: The current ordinance covers occupants of buildings with four or more units and protects current tenants and former tenants who occupied a unit within the 12 months preceding an application for conversion; the city is proposing to extend the ordinance and apply it to buildings with two or more units while maintaining an owner-occupancy exemption for small owner‑occupied buildings. Karina Oliver Milchman said the ordinance “requires owners who intend to convert rental units to condominiums or cooperative to provide certain rights and benefits to tenants.”

- Notice periods and rights: Under the ordinance as presented, owners must give at least 12 months’ notice before vacancy for general tenants and five years’ notice for special populations (seniors aged 62 or older, people with disabilities, and low- or moderate‑income tenants). The ordinance provides lease extensions for the notice period, a right to purchase the future condo, and relocation benefits of $10,000 per unit for general households and $15,000 per unit for the special populations described above.

- Early detection and enforcement: City staff said the clearest point to identify a conversion is filing of a master deed, which frequently occurs after displacement. To detect conversions earlier the administration is adding and tracking signals such as an ISD (Inspectional Services Department) permit question about whether a permit is associated with conversion, flagging HSNA portal notices to quit that reference conversion, and using OHS (Office of Housing Stability) intake reports. The administration has also revamped the web page for the tool, added outreach through the ISD newsletter and said it will do proactive outreach to property owners if coverage expands. Sheila Dillon, Chief of Housing for the City of Boston, said, "We have an opportunity to strengthen this important tool, and make improvements on its enforcement."

- State-law constraints: Mac McCray of Greater Boston Legal Services reminded the committee that the city’s authority comes from a 1983 state condominium-conversion statute and that any changes that go “beyond” the state baseline typically require adoption by emergency ordinance and a supermajority vote. "The statewide law does provide Boston with authority to regulate condominium conversion and its effects on residents, but it does have some unique provisions," McCray said, explaining why certain changes may need parallel state‑level work.

Data and impact discussed

- The Mayor’s Office of Housing reported 2,100 rental units were lost to conversion from 2019 through 2024 (the presentation aggregated that period). The administration’s modeling showed expanding coverage to two‑plus units would have protected roughly 97–99% of the rental units lost to conversion in recent years versus about 25% under the current four‑plus threshold.

- Neighborhood concentration: staff said most conversions in smaller buildings are concentrated in lower‑income neighborhoods and named Dorchester, Hyde Park, Mattapan, Roslindale, Roxbury and parts of East Boston and Jamaica Plain.

Public comment and next steps

- Tenant advocates called for prompt action. Kathy Brown of the Boston Tenant Coalition, who said she helped lead the original campaign decades ago, urged passage of the extension and continued work on acquisition and other tools to keep units out of speculative markets.

- Councilors asked for follow‑up working sessions to draft specific language on enforcement mechanisms (for example, a proposed preliminary conversion permit or a waiting period if units are cleared out within the 12‑month lookback) and to explore whether additional protected categories — veterans, families with children, undocumented residents or returning citizens — could be added or would require state action. Councilors and staff also discussed the administrative capacity required to monitor a larger set of covered buildings and noted relocation payments are paid by owners, not by the city.

No final vote was taken at the hearing. Committee members and staff said they will schedule a working session to refine ordinance language, enforcement processes, and any accompanying state outreach needed to secure expanded authority.

Members of the administration and advocates agreed the renewal and the expansion to two‑ and three‑family buildings would be a material change in the ordinance’s reach. As tenant advocate Kathy Brown put it, referring to neighborhood housing stock of two‑ and three‑family houses, "this is such a big change... I think, changing it from the four units to the two and three is a big change."