NYC heat season landlord requirements for 2026‑27, the rules, the fines and the 2 AM no‑heat call

From October 1 to May 31, New York City landlords must keep apartments at 68°F or more between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. whenever it is below 55°F outside, and at 62°F or more between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. whatever the weather, with 120°F hot water all year (HPD). A heat violation costs $350 to $1,250 a day, and from October 1, 2026 HPD investigates every heat complaint as an individual case instead of linking complaints from the same building (HPD penalties, Block by Block housing plan).

Kreedl is our product. It appears in this guide where it changes the outcome, and we say so each time. The rules, fines and dates below were checked against nyc.gov on October 17, 2026.

TL;DR: the 2026-27 heat season in one table

What are the NYC heat and hot water requirements?

Owners must provide heat from October 1 to May 31 and hot water all year. The day rule depends on the weather outside. The night rule does not.

HPD sets out the rules on its heat and hot water page:

• Day (6 a.m. to 10 p.m.). If it is below 55°F outside, it must be at least 68°F inside.
• Night (10 p.m. to 6 a.m.). It must be at least 62°F inside, “regardless of what the outside temperature is.”
• Hot water. A constant minimum of 120°F, 365 days a year.

The night rule is the one that catches teams out. A boiler that trips at 11 p.m. on a mild October night is still a violation by 2 a.m. if the apartments fall below 62°F. The NYC Housing Court states the same day and night thresholds.

There is a second, lower line. HPD’s Emergency Repair Program may restore heat itself and bill the owner for the repair and related fees if inside temperatures fall below 64°F during the day or below 58°F at night. At that point the city is fixing your boiler and sending you the invoice.

What changed for the 2026-27 heat season?

The temperatures, dates and fines are the same as last year. The change is how HPD handles complaints: from October 1, 2026, it investigates every heat complaint as an individual case.

Until now, HPD linked complaints from the same address. If the tenant who filed the first complaint was not home when the inspector came, or said the heat was back, the other complaints from that address could be closed too. The city’s housing plan, Block by Block, published on May 26, 2026, ends that: “HPD will investigate every heat complaint as an individual case starting on October 1, 2026” (Block by Block, p. 21). The Mayor’s Office repeated it in the Rental Ripoff Report on July 16, 2026 as “investigating every heat complaint individually rather than consolidating complaints from the same building.”

The same plan says that from fall 2026, when an inspector cannot get into an apartment, tenants who gave a phone number will get a text to book a follow-up visit. A missed inspection is now more likely to lead to a second one.

Volume is rising too. HPD counted 344,437 heat complaints in the 2025-26 season, against 282,606 the season before. The busiest single day was February 8, 2026, with 6,144 complaints (HPD statistics as of May 31, 2026).

What this means for a managing agent: when a building loses heat overnight, every apartment that calls 311 can now become its own case, and its own inspection attempt. Fixing the boiler fast and telling every affected tenant that it is fixed matters more than it did last winter.

What happens after a tenant calls 311 about no heat?

HPD contacts you before it sends an inspector. If heat is not back, or HPD cannot reach the tenant, an inspector comes, unannounced.

NYC311 tells tenants to try their landlord, managing agent or super first: “Before filing a complaint, you should try to resolve the issue with your landlord, managing agent, or superintendent” (NYC311). So the first no-heat report usually comes to you. Only if nobody answers, or nothing happens, does it go to the city.

Once a complaint is filed, NYC311 and HPD describe the same sequence:

1. HPD attempts to contact the owner or managing agent to say the building may have no heat.
2. HPD may call the tenant back to ask whether heat is restored. If it is, the complaint is closed.
3. If heat is not restored, or HPD cannot reach the tenant, a uniformed Code Enforcement inspector is sent.
4. The owner or agent is not told the inspection date.
5. If the inspector measures below 68°F by day (with outside below 55°F) or below 62°F at night, a violation is issued.

Two practical points follow. First, the number HPD calls is the one in your property registration. HPD requires a phone number in the metro area where the owner or managing agent can be reached “at all times” (HPD property registration). If that number goes to an office voicemail at night, the first warning goes nowhere. Second, tenants can file anonymously, in which case the inspector picks an apartment at random to inspect.

What does a heat violation cost?

Heat and hot water violations are Class C, immediately hazardous, with no grace period before penalties apply. The money adds up from several directions.

Penalties run from the day the violation is posted until it is corrected. Note that HPD’s heat page still shows the older $250 to $500 range. The penalties page carries the amounts that apply to violations issued since December 8, 2023.

There is one discount worth knowing. HPD’s certification form lets an owner satisfy the civil penalty with a single payment if it is the first heat violation since the start of the previous heat season and it was corrected within 24 hours of the notice being posted. HPD’s heat page lists that payment as $250. The certification itself is due within ten days of the notice. A fix in 24 hours is only possible if someone heard about the problem in the first hour.

What is the Heat Sensors Program?

It is HPD’s program for buildings with repeat heat problems. Each year HPD selects 50 buildings based on heat violations over the previous two years and complaints from more than one unit (HPD). Selected owners must install a heat sensor in each unit, in a living room the tenant chooses, by October 1 of the year they are notified. HPD inspects at least twice a month from October 1 to January 31. Buildings stay in for four years unless they qualify for early discharge. HPD published its July 2026 building list on the same page.

How do NYC teams cover no-heat calls at night?

Most teams use one of four setups. We compared them on four questions: does it pick up at 2 a.m., does it log the time by itself, does it decide anything, and can you show later what happened and when. We left out prices, which depend on portfolio size.

1. Office voicemail: the tenant’s next call is 311

The tenant does what NYC311 tells them, calls you first, hears a greeting and hangs up. The next call is to 311, and HPD’s call to your registered number lands in the same voicemail. You learn about the outage from the inspector’s report.

Best for: nothing during heat season. Keep it only as the last fallback behind a line that picks up.

Voicemail stores the message, Kreedl answers it and starts the record.

2. The super’s cell phone: good judgement, no record

A live-in super who answers at 2 a.m. is the best first responder on this list. They know the boiler, the burner company and which apartments run cold. The weak points are the nights they sleep through, the weekends they are away, and the lack of any written record of who called, when and what was done. When five apartments call the same super about the same outage, nobody else knows.

Best for: single buildings with a resident super who can reliably answer at night, as the escalation step behind a first line.

The super decides when they pick up, Kreedl picks up every call and wakes the super with the unit, the time and what the tenant reported.

3. Answering service: picked up, then passed on

A call center answers in your name, follows a script and pages the on-call contact. Every call gets a time stamp, which is a real improvement. The limit is the script. The operator does not know which buildings share a boiler, cannot tell a building-wide outage from one cold radiator, and usually passes on a short note to call the tenant back.

Best for: portfolios that want a human voice on the line and have an on-call engineer who can act on a short note.

An answering service logs the call and passes it on, Kreedl identifies the unit, applies your rules and follows the job until it is closed.

4. Where Kreedl fits

Best for: NYC portfolios from a few buildings upward that want every night call answered, triaged by their own rules and recorded, without adding a night shift.

A triage table for no-heat reports at night

Whoever answers at night, a person or an AI, needs simple rules. Use this as a starting point and agree your own with your compliance lead and your heating contractor.

Example rules, not legal advice. If anyone is in danger, the tenant should call 911 first.

What to have in place before the first cold night

• A registration number that answers at night. Check that the managing agent phone in your HPD registration reaches a person or a line that picks up “at all times.”
• One night line for every channel. Calls, texts, WhatsApp and email should all reach the same place, at any hour.
• A timestamp on every report, written automatically, not reconstructed in the morning.
• A list of buildings that share a boiler, so one call can be checked against the whole building.
• An on-call heating contractor with names, numbers and a spending limit agreed in advance.
• Vulnerability flags on the units that need them: older tenants, newborns, medical needs.
• A message template telling tenants what is wrong, who is coming and when heat is expected back.
• A correction routine: who certifies corrections to HPD, and how you prove heat was restored within 24 hours.
• The Heat Sensors list. Check whether any of your buildings is on HPD’s July 2026 list.

How do you know your night line works?

Test it the way a tenant would. Call your own line at 11 p.m. on a weekday, say the heat is off in a named apartment, and send a photo of a thermostat by text or WhatsApp. Then call the number in your HPD registration at the same hour.

The next morning, pull the record and check four things: the logged time against the time you called, whether the unit was identified without you spelling it out, who was woken and when, and whether the “tenant” got a message saying what happens next. If either call reached voicemail, that is the gap a 311 complaint fills.

Repeat it once a month during heat season, and after any change to your on-call rota or contractor. If you want to hear how Kreedl handles a night report before changing anything, there is a live test call at kreedl.com/try.

When Kreedl is the wrong choice

If you own one building and your super lives on site, answers at night and keeps a simple log, that setup works and Kreedl is more than you need. If your heat problems are mechanical, an old boiler or a burner that keeps tripping, no phone line fixes them: start with the contractor and the equipment. And if your tenants cannot use a phone at all, you need someone on site, not a line.

FAQs

Sources

1. Heat and Hot Water Information (NYC HPD. Season, temperatures, complaint steps, Emergency Repair Program thresholds, 2025-26 complaint statistics)
2. Penalties and Fees (NYC HPD. Civil penalties from December 8, 2023 and the $200 inspection fee)
3. Heat or Hot Water Complaint in a Residential Building (NYC311. What tenants do first and what happens after a complaint)
4. Block by Block: The Housing Plan for a New Era (City of New York, May 26, 2026, p. 21. Individual investigation of heat complaints from October 1, 2026; re-inspection texts from fall 2026)
5. Mayor Mamdani Releases “Rental Ripoff Report” (NYC Mayor’s Office, July 16, 2026)
6. Heat Sensors Program (NYC HPD. Selection, sensors, inspections and fees under Local Law 18 of 2020 as amended by Local Law 70 of 2023)
7. Register Your Property (NYC HPD. Annual registration and the contact number reachable at all times)
8. Certification of Correction, heat and hot water (NYC HPD. Ten-day certification and the first-violation payment option)
9. Cold Weather Heat Requirements (NYC Housing Court)

This article is general information, not legal advice. Rules, fines and dates are correct as of October 17, 2026. Check the latest HPD guidance before you change your procedures.