From a Rent-Stabilized Queens Apartment to Gracie Mansion: A Look at Zohran Mamdani’s New Home

For the last seven years, Zohran Mamdani has lived in a one-bedroom, rent-stablized apartment in Astoria, Queens.

His living arrangements were the target of frequent attacks by his opponents throughout the campaign, who suggested Mamdani was too rich to receive the benefit that allowed him to pay $2,300 a month.

But he will soon be getting a substantial upgrade thanks to his stunning victory in the New York City mayoral election, moving across the river to Gracie Mansion, the official residence of the city’s mayor.  

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This change of scenery, located on the farthest end of the Upper East Side of Manhattan, is more than just a borough jump and zipcode switch for Mamdani and his wife, Rama Duwaji, an animator and illustrator.

A concession stand and a restroom 

Gracie Mansion was built in 1799 as a summer home for a Scottish merchant, Archibald Gracie. The mansion has lived many lives before becoming the official residence of New York City’s mayors in 1942. As one of the oldest surviving wood structures in Manhattan, it is a member of New York’s Historic House Trust and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Over the years, the ownership of the mansion has changed hands, transforming the space within its wooden walls from the home of a Scottish immigrant to that of Joseph Foulke and his family in 1823, and then to Noah Wheaton in 1857.

Read More: ‘A Politics of No Translation.’ Zohran Mamdani on His Unlikely Rise

In 1896, non-payment of taxes led the City of New York to appropriate the estate, along with the surrounding 11 acres, into East River Park. For about 15 years, the mansion served as a concession stand and restroom for the Park until it became the first home of the Museum of the City of New York in 1925.  However, the museum was later moved to its Colonial Revival building on Fifth Avenue.

Gracie Mansion served as the first historic house museum run by the Parks Department until “power broker” Commissioner Robert Moses persuaded City officials to designate the house as the official residence of the Mayor. The once summer home became a residential dwelling once more. On the cusp of the Second World War, in 1942, Fiorello H. La Guardia and his family moved in, setting a precedent for the city’s mayors to come. Each of them would go on to make Gracie Mansion not only a private residence but also a symbolic extension of New York City’s public life. 

Zohran Mamdani’s current home 

The more-than two-hundred-year-old city landmark overlooking the East River sits directly across from Mamdani’s current neighborhood of Astoria, Queens. Here, the 34-year-old former Assembly member lives in a $2,300 a month, one-bedroom rent-stabilized apartment with his wife, Rama Duwaji. 

Mamdani’s rent-stabilized apartment in a prewar six-story building in Queens is a fitting backdrop for a politician who has built his career on housing justice. The 1920s-era structure, known as the Princess Martha, features approximately fifty apartments and retains many of its original details, including hardwood floors, a windowed eat-in kitchen, and a king-size bedroom with deep closets.

Read more: The Billionaires Who Failed to Stop Zohran Mamdani, and How Much They Spent

Mamdani found the place in 2018 on StreetEasy while earning $47,000 a year as a foreclosure-prevention counselor for a Queens nonprofit.  “I was looking for an apartment that I could afford on my own,” he told the New York Times Editorial Board, adding, “I found that in this apartment.” That early experience of finding stability through a rent-regulated unit now informs his call for a citywide rent freeze covering roughly a million such apartments. 

“If I was able to put in a rent freeze, I wouldn’t be in a rent-stabilized apartment. I would actually be on the Upper East Side, in a new apartment,” he said, referencing Gracie Mansion.

Not all mayors lived in the mansion 

When the mansion itself was built in 1799, Archibald Gracie couldn’t afford the finer luxuries that would befit a future mayor of the city: the doors were stained to look like mahogany, and the foyer floors were painted to mimic black-and-white marble rather than being made of the real thing.

Additionally, the rent-free mansion has struggled to attract mayors of the city’s past. 

Although Parks Commissioner Robert Moses updated it with heating, electricity, rugs, and draperies, several mayors initially declined to move in, concerned about the political and personal implications of living in a mansion. 

Fiorello H. La Guardia famously resisted for years, preferring his modest East 109th Street apartment, and only moved into the mansion in 1942, during World War II, when safety concerns made it a practical choice.

So when La Guardia finally moved into Gracie Mansion, the official residence of New York City’s mayor experienced major modifications. La Guardia, for one, added a master bedroom, kitchen, and offices. Later in 1966, the Susan E. Wagner Wing was added to provide a dedicated space for official events and greater privacy for the mayor’s family.

The $800,000 wing, named after the late wife of former Mayor Robert F. Wagner, includes a 50-foot-long reproduction of an 18th-century ballroom. Mayor John Lindsay formally accepted the deed to the new wing on behalf of the city, marking a significant step in the mansion’s evolution as both a residence and a ceremonial space.

Like La Guardia, Koch initially hesitated to leave his cramped Village apartment but eventually embraced the mansion, establishing the Gracie Mansion Conservancy in 1981 to restore the house and manage it as a cultural hub. Politics often influenced these decisions, as living in the mansion could conflict with an image of humility or connection to everyday New Yorkers.

Major restorations followed in 1983–1984, when the interior was restored with historical decorations and plumbing and electrical systems were upgraded, and again in 2002 under former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who updated both the interior and exterior while improving public accessibility. Bloomberg established it as a “living museum” in 2002. 

Despite spending heavily to restore the mansion, Bloomberg chose to live in his Upper East Side townhouse, emphasizing the mansion’s role as a venue for municipal events, meetings with foreign dignitaries, and public tours rather than as a personal residence. In addition to structural changes, the mansion’s living spaces have been modernized over time. 

Former mayor Bill de Blasio initially wanted to remain in his Park Slope home, reflecting a political concern about image, but eventually moved into Gracie Mansion in 2014. When they did move, De Blasio and Chirlane McCray updated the upstairs residential area with contemporary furniture from West Elm, marking a departure from its historic pieces. 

Under de Blasio, the mansion became a space that blended residential, artistic, and civic functions, including exhibitions exploring social change, while maintaining the mansion’s long-standing public and political significance.