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An HPD lead paint violation that needs abatement takes 68 days to clear. Most never clear at all.
median from inspection to accepted certification, for the 5,806 Class C lead paint violations whose text names abatement
Every other kind of lead-based paint violation certifies in a median of 34 days. That is the answer to the question, and it is the smaller half of the story. Across all 76,021 lead paint violations New York City has recorded since August 3, 2023, 20.6% of the Class C ones have ever been certified corrected, and 57.8% have sat open more than a year with nothing filed against them.
If you own the building. A lead paint violation does not age off the record. It stays visible on HPD Online and surfaces at sale, refinance and permit, whether or not anyone reinspects it.
If you work these cases. 18,253 lead paint violations sit at NOV Sent Out with no later status at all, and 6,226 more are waiting on a refiled certification. That is the volume nobody is currently chasing.
If you rent here. The record shows an inspector confirmed the hazard. It does not show that anyone fixed it, and on this category it usually does not show a second inspection either.
Why lead paint violations stay open for years
57.8% of Class C lead paint violations have sat open more than a year with no certification on file. Only 0.9% carry Not Complied With, the status that says a deadline passed without an accepted certification. Those two numbers describe the same buildings and they do not agree.
The status ladder shows where the gap opens. HPD sets Not Complied With after a reinspection confirms the condition is still there, so a case nobody reinspects never reaches it. 3,762 violations are recorded as no access for reinspection. 18,253 sit at NOV Sent Out with no later status at all, meaning the notice went to the owner and the record has nothing after it. A lead paint violation that is never corrected mostly does not get marked as defied. It stays open.
| Current status | Violations | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Violation Closed | 42,573 | 56.0% |
| Nov Sent Out | 18,253 | 24.0% |
| Defect Letter Issued | 6,226 | 8.2% |
| First No Access To Re- Inspect Violation | 3,762 | 4.9% |
| Certification Postponment Granted | 1,615 | 2.1% |
| Violation Will Be Reinspected | 726 | 1.0% |
| Not Complied With | 674 | 0.9% |
| Certification Postponment Denied | 673 | 0.9% |
| Lead Docs Submitted, Not Acceptable | 493 | 0.6% |
| Nov Certified Late | 354 | 0.5% |
| Lead Docs Submitted, Acceptable | 273 | 0.4% |
| Invalid Certification | 243 | 0.3% |
Every status HPD has recorded against a lead-based paint violation, most common first, out of 76,021. Status names link to the status glossary where a page exists.
What HPD means by lead paint abatement
The 5,806 violations behind the 68-day figure cite sections 27-2056.7 through 27-2056.9 of the Administrative Code, which is the turnover rule: when a unit in a pre-1960 building turns over, the owner must address lead hazards before it is occupied again and certify that it was done. Every one of them is Class C, the class HPD reserves for conditions it treats as immediately hazardous. That is why the abatement slice is slower than the rest. It is not a repair an owner can make and photograph. The work has to be performed by an EPA-certified firm and documented, and the documentation is reviewed separately from the work. The abatement ones also certify less often when they do finish: 17.4% against 20.9%.
How lead paint compares with other HPD violations
Certification rate is the share of a category's Class C violations that have ever been certified corrected. Lead paint ranks 5 of 6 on it, at 20.6%. Vermin and pests sits at 51.7%, more than twice the rate, on a comparable Class C population. An HPD violation for no heat, which carries the same immediately-hazardous class, clears in single-digit days.
| Category | Class C violations | Ever certified | Median days |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vermin and pests | 197,009 | 51.7% | 26 |
| Heat and hot water | 148,224 | 49.0% | 9 |
| Water leaks | 26,870 | 34.5% | 14 |
| Electrical | 12,050 | 29.1% | 12 |
| Lead paint | 67,735 | 20.6% | 35 |
| Mold | 11,955 | 17.7% | 33 |
Same query behind the certification block on all thirty borough and category pages, summed citywide. Median days is weighted by each borough's Class C volume. The six categories are independent text matches rather than a partition of the record: a violation naming both a leak and mold is counted under both, so these rows do not sum to HPD's total.
Why HPD rejects most lead paint certifications
Lead is the only category where HPD records the document review as a status of its own, so the acceptance rate is measurable here and nowhere else on this site. Of 766 lead document submissions, 493 were marked not acceptable against 273 acceptable. That is 64% rejected on the filing, before anything about the underlying work has been judged. A further 6,226 violations sit at Defect Letter Issued, which is HPD telling an owner the submitted certification was insufficient and has to be refiled. For an owner, a rejected filing is not the end of the clock. The violation stays open while it is redone.
Lead paint violations by borough
The Bronx carries 41.4% of New York City's lead paint violations on this record, 31,475 of 76,021. Certification rates do not follow volume. Staten Island has the fewest at 575 and the lowest share ever certified, 13.8%, against 21.8% in Brooklyn.
| Borough | Violations | Share of city | Class C certified | Class C open past a year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bronx | 31,475 | 41.4% | 21.5% | 58.7% |
| Brooklyn | 23,717 | 31.2% | 21.8% | 54.8% |
| Manhattan | 11,365 | 14.9% | 20.0% | 59.9% |
| Queens | 8,889 | 11.7% | 15.1% | 59.0% |
| Staten Island | 575 | 0.8% | 13.8% | 64.9% |
Each borough's lead paint page carries the same figures alongside its other five categories: Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island.
Common questions about HPD lead paint violations
How long does a lead paint abatement violation take to certify?
A median of 68 days, measured on the 5,806 Class C lead-based paint violations whose text names abatement and that carry an accepted certification. Every other kind of lead-based paint violation certifies in a median of 34 days.
Why are so few lead paint violations marked Not Complied With?
674 of 76,021 carry that status, 0.9%, while 57.8% of the Class C ones have sat open more than a year with no certification on file. HPD sets Not Complied With after a reinspection confirms the condition, so a violation nobody reinspects does not reach it. 3,762 are recorded as no access for reinspection and 18,253 sit at NOV Sent Out with no later status. The record shows where cases stop; it does not say why.
How often does HPD accept the lead paperwork?
Of 766 lead document submissions on this record, 493 were marked not acceptable and 273 acceptable. That is a 64% rejection rate on the filing itself, before anything about the underlying work is decided.
Does this page arrange or certify an abatement?
No. This page reads the public record. Lead abatement in New York City must be performed by an EPA-certified firm and certified with HPD directly. Nothing here files, represents, or advises.
What this record does not tell you
It does not say why a case stopped where it did. A violation at NOV Sent Out may have been corrected without a certification ever being filed, or not corrected at all, and the public record does not distinguish the two. It does not carry the inspection findings, a blood lead level, or anything about who lives in the unit. It is not legal advice and it is not a compliance check on any specific address. If you own or manage a building with a lead paint violation, the correction is filed with HPD directly and the work has to be done by a certified firm. How to read the record for your own building.
Aggregates only. No building and no owner is named on this page. Every figure queried at this deploy from our own copy of HPD's Housing Maintenance Code Violations dataset, covering inspections recorded August 3, 2023 through August 31, 2026. Sources: NYC Open Data, cited not linked. How HPD violations get dismissed, status codes decoded, the record by borough, citywide, ViolationScout.