Sublet vs. Lease Assignment vs. Lease Break in NYC

This is general information about New York housing law as of November 2026, not legal advice. Your building type changes the answer. Co-op proprietary leases are outside the sublet statute entirely. Start with your lease, and read subletting laws in New York for the longer version.

You have three ways off a New York lease before it ends. They are not flavors of the same thing.

• A sublet keeps you on the lease. Someone else lives there for part of the term.
• An assignment (what listings call a lease takeover) moves the rest of the lease to someone else, if the landlord agrees, and can get you released.
• A lease break is you leaving. The landlord then has to try to re-rent, and you owe the rent until that happens or until you buy your way out.

On Ohana, New York has already voted with bookings. We have 5,772 booked sublets in the city, for 5,438 people, and 278 booked lease takeovers. These Ohana figures are refreshed every day. The sublet is the normal path. The takeover is the path when you are not coming back and the owner will let you off. The break is what you do when neither of those works.

8,713 people have booked a stay on Ohana across 9,304 bookings. The New York sublets among them last a median of 69 nights, and 72 percent of the move-ins fall in May through August. That is a summer-shaped market. Pick the legal tool that matches whether you are coming back.

The short version

Who stays on the lease?

• Sublet. You do. Someone else lives there, and you are still the tenant.
• Assignment, or takeover. The new tenant does, if the landlord releases you in writing.
• Lease break. You do, until a new lease starts or the original term ends.

Does the landlord have to agree?

• Sublet. Yes. In a building with four or more apartments, they cannot refuse for a bad reason.
• Assignment. Yes, and they may refuse for any reason.
• Lease break. This is not a request for permission. You are in breach unless a statute or a clause in your lease lets you out.

What if they say no?

• Sublet. If the refusal is unreasonable, you may sublet anyway. If a court finds they acted in bad faith, they can owe your costs and attorney's fees.
• Assignment. If the refusal is unreasonable, you can demand a release on 30 days' notice. That release is the only remedy. You cannot assign the lease over their objection.
• Lease break. You still owe the rent. The landlord has to try to re-rent the apartment.

What if they say nothing?

• Sublet. A proper certified-mail request with no answer in 30 days counts as consent.
• Assignment. Silence is not an assignment. Do not hand over the lease.
• Lease break. Silence is not a release.

When it is the right tool

• Sublet, when you are leaving for a while and coming back.
• Assignment, when you are done with the apartment and you have a qualified person ready.
• Lease break, when you have no replacement, or you qualify for an exit the statute already allows.

The statute for sublets and assignments is Real Property Law 226-b. The duty to re-rent after a break is Real Property Law 227-e.

What a sublet is

You remain the tenant. The subtenant has a contract with you, not with the owner, unless the owner has signed something that says otherwise. If the subtenant stops paying, the landlord comes to you. If they damage the apartment, the deposit conversation is yours.

That ongoing liability is why landlords agree to sublets more readily than to assignments. It is also why you should meet the person, in a video call if not in the apartment, before you hand over keys. Our bookings move quickly once a listing is up: among New York sublets booked within six months of publishing, the median time from going live to a booking is 11 days, across 5,157 bookings. Permission from the landlord is a separate 30-day process. Do not let the fast booking outrun the letter. How to send that letter is in how to ask your NYC landlord for permission to sublet.

In a rent-stabilized apartment the sublet has extra limits, spelled out in Rent Stabilization Code 2525.6. You must keep the apartment as your primary residence and mean to return. Total sublet time cannot exceed two years out of the four years before the sublease ends. You cannot charge more than the legal rent, plus up to 10 percent if the apartment is fully furnished. A sublet you set up because you have moved away for good is how stabilized tenants lose the apartment.

What an assignment is

You transfer the remaining term. The new person steps into your position. You want a release in the same signing, or you have accomplished a sublet and called it something else.

The landlord may refuse an assignment even without a compelling reason. The tradeoff in the statute is sharp: if that refusal is unreasonable, you get out. You give notice, and 30 days later the lease is done. You do not get to assign the lease over their objection. If the refusal is reasonable, nothing happens. You are still the tenant, and you should switch plans to a sublet or a negotiated exit.

We have a full walkthrough in lease takeovers in NYC. One number from that data is worth repeating here. Those 278 New York takeovers are not all "the rest of a year-long lease." The median length is 30 nights, and the average is 102 nights. Ask for the end date before you decide the label.

What a break is

You vacate in violation of a fixed term. A few situations are lawful exits rather than breaches: military duty under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, domestic violence under Real Property Law 227-c, and some moves by older tenants or tenants with disabilities under Real Property Law 227-a. Everyone else is negotiating, or relying on the landlord's duty to mitigate.

That duty is real. The landlord has to try, in good faith, to re-rent at market or at your rate, whichever is lower. When the new lease starts, yours ends. They have the burden of proof. You still owe the uncovered months, and a buyout is whatever you agree, not a number in the statute. The longer version, including deposits and credit, is in how to break your lease in NYC.

Which one should you pick?

Ask one question: are you coming back to this apartment as your home?

If yes, sublet. Keep your name on the lease. In a larger rental building the landlord has to consider your request seriously, and a proper request that they ignore becomes consent. Charge a fair number. As of November 1, 2026, rooms listed on Ohana in New York with upcoming availability have a median price of $1,883 a month. Entire homes have a median of $3,959. Those prices are what a guest sees, including Ohana's service fee, across 3,841 listings you can book soon. They are a sanity check, not a legal cap, except in a stabilized apartment, where the legal rent is the cap and furniture adds at most 10 percent.

If no, ask for an assignment, and be ready for the landlord to prefer a sublet. Offer a qualified person either way. If they unreasonably block the assignment, take the release. If they reasonably block it, sublet the remaining months so the rent does not become a debt.

If you have nobody, and you do not qualify for a statutory exit, you are in break territory. Keep paying while the apartment is marketed. Stopping payment is the step that turns a housing problem into a credit problem.

A composite from the bookings

Same city, three outcomes, none of them a specific person.

A tenant leaving for a three-month internship sublets a room. In Bushwick, rooms on Ohana are listed around $1,738 a month, across 126 current listings. The listing books on something like the 11-day median. The tenant stays liable, comes back in August, and the sublet ends. That is the 69-night shape of the New York book.

A tenant leaving the city for good asks to assign a market-rate lease and has a qualified person who can start on the first. The landlord agrees and signs a release. That is one of the 278 takeovers, and it only counts as one if the release is real.

A tenant who offers neither, and who moves out over a weekend, is a break. The landlord has to look for a replacement. The tenant owes the gap. A room that could have been listed near the Bed-Stuy median of $1,489, where we have 261 rooms available, instead becomes months of rent with no guest and no release.

What the law requires, in one place

• Sublet request. Certified mail, return receipt requested, with the term, the subtenant's name, their business and permanent home address, your reason, your address during the sublet, consent of any co-tenant or guarantor, and a copy of the proposed sublease. The landlord has 10 days to ask for more information and 30 days to answer. No answer means consent. You remain liable. This applies to dwellings with four or more residential units. It does not apply to public housing or to a co-op proprietary lease.
• Assignment. Written consent. Unreasonable refusal leads to a release on 30 days' notice, and that release is the tenant's only remedy. Reasonable refusal leads to no assignment and no release.
• Break. Landlord must mitigate under 227-e. Security deposits on most market-rate units have to be itemized and returned within 14 days under General Obligations Law 7-108.

Buildings with one, two, or three units do not get the 226-b sublet right. Your lease controls. Ask anyway, in writing. A yes is a yes. A no does not flip into deemed consent.

What it costs, side by side

Sublet: your time, a possible application fee, and the risk you are already on the hook for. If the guest pays the rent, your monthly cost of leaving can be close to zero. Current medians, one neighborhood at a time:

• East Village: entire homes $3,970 (65 listings), rooms $2,622 (133).
• Upper East Side: entire homes $3,615 (76 listings), rooms $1,823 (197).
• Williamsburg: entire homes $4,976 (21 listings), rooms $2,166 (156).
• Hell's Kitchen: entire homes $4,868 (37 listings), rooms $2,474 (146).

See what is listed now on New York City sublets.

Assignment: usually no "Ohana fee" in the statute, sometimes a landlord application fee, and the deposit has to be re-papered. Your cost is the weeks until consent, during which you still pay.

Break: the uncovered rent, plus any buyout you agree to, plus the chance of a dispute over the deposit. It is the only option of the three that starts with you in breach.

People who stayed and reviewed the host afterward, 1,578 of them on Ohana, left an average of 4.8 out of 5. Of those reviews, 1,398 are a perfect 5. One of them: "Really nice apartment and great location. Loved subletting and would for sure do it again." The machinery works when the legal object and the listing say the same thing.

Questions people ask

Which is cheapest?

A sublet that books, in a building where you have the right to ask. You keep liability, and you stop paying for an empty apartment. An accepted assignment is a close second and leaves you cleaner. A break is the expensive one.

Can my landlord charge me for the privilege?

They cannot unreasonably withhold a sublet in a qualifying building as a way to reset your rent. In a stabilized apartment there are hard caps on what you can charge the subtenant. A buyout on a break is negotiated. Get any fee in writing and match it to a lease clause or an invoice, not a Venmo request.

What if my lease says no subletting, ever?

In a dwelling with four or more units, 226-b still gives you the right to request a sublet, and consent cannot be unreasonably withheld. A lease clause does not delete the statute. In a co-op, the proprietary lease does control. In a building under four units, the clause is much more likely to be the whole answer.

Does a break show up on my record?

Not by itself. Unpaid rent that is reported or reduced to a judgment can. A completed sublet or a signed release does not.