Winning a Housing Lottery and Figuring Out How to Get Out of a Lease The affordable unit was bigger, but also more expensive than her studio. She decided it was worth it. Rodica Miller, a special-education teacher, didn’t want to get priced out of Roosevelt Island. So when the chance to take a stabilized, affordable apartment came up, she jumped at it. The apartment was, however, more expensive than her market-rate studio.Credit...Tom Sibley for The New York Times April 26, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ET Last fall, Rodica Miller found herself in a somewhat strange situation: She had won an affordable-housing lottery for a one-bedroom apartment just steps from the Roosevelt Island studio where she’d been living since 2018. But moving there would mean a substantial rent increase: from $2,050 a month to $2,468 a month.