Restaurants struggle with rent under coronavirus restrictions in New York City
More than 80% of respondents said they couldn’t pay May rent, or they only paid part of it
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New York City restaurants are facing numerous obstacles during the coronavirus pandemic, but one of the greatest challenges is paying rent, according to one report.
On Thursday, the New York City Hospitality Alliance released the results of a survey of 483 restaurants, bars, clubs and event venues in the city.
It found that 87.1 percent of respondents either couldn’t pay rent for the month of May or could only pay some of rent.
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Only 12.9 percent said they would pay all of their May rent, according to the survey.
That’s a difficult task for restaurants, which still can’t reopen their dining rooms to customers and have to rely on takeout and delivery orders.
Earlier this month, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the moratorium on evictions would extend to August 20.
However, some restaurants are worried they’ll be expected to pay their back rent all at once after that deadline, according to a report from Eater.
“Luckily we do have some good landlords who understand the situation,” one coffee chain owner told Eater. “But when the governor’s moratorium ends, some landlords might evict us.”
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Aside from questions about rent, the New York City Hospitality Alliance also asked restaurants about their reopening process and coronavirus assistance.
According to the survey, 61 percent of respondents said that in order to operate their business, they need 70 percent occupancy or more.
In fact, 12.8 percent said they need 100 percent capacity in order to operate and 22.1 percent said they need at least 80 percent capacity to operate.
The survey also found that 43.4 percent of business owners believe they’ll be able to fully reopen after the coronavirus, while 3.6 percent said they believe they will have to permanently close. Another 53 percent said they weren’t sure.
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The alliance also reported that only 7.5 percent of respondents will be able to hire back employees so that their PPP loan will be forgivable.
Another 42.1 percent of respondents said they are unsure if they’ll use their PPP loan “due to the fact that we may not be able to rehire employees to pre-pandemic levels in time for loan forgiveness.”
The other 50.4 percent said they didn’t receive a PPP loan in the first round of funding, the survey found.