Brendon DeSimone

26

Aug
2026

Usually, you only hear about “air rights” in New York and other big cities. Even if you live in a suburban neighborhood, though, you should have an understanding of air rights in general. Who owns air rights above your property? And what can you do—and not do—with those rights?

* Most likely, you own the air rights. Up to a point.

Most property ownership laws are based on the Latin doctrine, “For whoever owns the soil, it is theirs up to heaven and down to hell.” But air rights became more limited in the 20^th century, thanks to airplanes. Homeowners only had rights to the airspace above their home that they could reasonably use. Without this restriction, airplanes would be forever trespassing and the airline industry wouldn’t have taken off.

* Even if you own the air rights, you may not be able to build higher.

Local zoning ordinances usually prevent a homeowner from, say, building a small office high-rise on their property in a residential neighborhood, even if the homeowner owns the air rights to that property. Similarly, if you own a small home and want to expand it with additional stories, zoning regulations may prevent you from going up too high, even though you own the air rights.

* Air rights can have more value in NYC.

So are air rights worth anything to the homeowner? Sometimes, yes—if you live in dense urban areas such as New York City. Not using the air above your building? A developer may acquire those rights to expand a property next door. This New York Times article explains how some lucky homeowners took advantage of the opportunity to sell their air rights.

Even though you might own property in NYC, your air rights aren’t necessarily valuable. “The reality is that the value of air rights is based on what options the adding property owners have if they were to acquire the rights,” explains Miller Samuel Inc. President and CEO Jonathan J. Miller. “In other words, if the subject property has plenty of air rights to sell but none of the adjacent property owners are able to use them, then the seller has no one to sell them to. If the buyer needs to obtain a zoning variance first, then it would be risky to purchase the rights until the variance was secured.”

* Air rights aren’t the same as owning your view.

Air rights aside, you may have a great view, but it could disappear if local zoning laws allow the owner of a vacant lot next door to build a McMansion. However, you may have some say in your neighbor’s construction project. In some places, neighbors are allowed to voice their concerns at a public hearing before building permits are granted.

Bottom line: You probably own your air rights. But those rights are only valuable if someone else can actually use them for development purposes.