All stories about "Rent Stabilization"

Even though the first of three Rent Guidelines Board hearings into rent increases for stabilized apartments was a little restrained, the annual battle is still getting a little chippy. Landlords are demanding their customary double-digit increases because of escalating operating costs, and while they won't get that, the range of increases proposed by the RGB is fairly high given previous years' rates. Tenants need a momentum shift, and today, they've got one. The Times' Gretchen Morgensen files a story on the recent trend of private investment firms buying up rent-stabilized buildings, which becomes an exposé on how tenants are being harassed until they leave their apartments. The developers and their investment firm partners claim they are just enforcing the rules, and that's the case in many of these situations. But of course, that's not the truth everywhere, and the Times does a bit of hammering on the "predatory equity" topic. It ain't pretty for Vantage Properties, which has been in the news about harassment before and gets the dreaded Times chart treatment (right). They've purchased 9,200 rent-regulated units in Queens and Upper Manhattan with co-investor Apollo Management in just the past two years, and in one Queens complex with 2,124 apartments, nearly 1,000 housing court cases have been filed. Last month, a group of tenants sued Vantage, alleging that the company has engaged in deceptive practices that violate New York's consumer protection laws.
· Questions of Rent Tactics by Private Equity [NYT]
· Annual Rent War Theater Lacks Drama This Year [Curbed]

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In 2005, at the Rent Guidelines Board's annual public hearings to decide on rent increases for stabilized apartments, tenants shouted "you're parasites!" and one old lady took her top off. In 2006, tenants opted for a marching band approach, favoring whistles and pans over public nudity. In both cases, and indeed in every case, the RGB raises rents—less than what landlord groups want, and more than the usual rent freeze that tenant groups call for (the Post graphic above shows the annual increases). Yesterday was the first of three hearings to decide the 2008-2009 increases, and given the range that the RGB suggested, it's a certainty that the increases will be bigger than last years'. But that's not the headline. Stunningly, the crowd wasn't disruptive this year. The Times reports that half the Great Hall at Cooper Union was empty, and the Post comments that it was "strangely subdued meeting" following a "well-worn script." We heard that security was a tighter this year, but are we to believe that not one aged breast was bared in the name of freedom? Good thing there are still two more chances, on June 11 and 16.
· Board’s Proposal for Rent Increases Disappoints Landlords and Tenants Alike [NYT]
· Apt. Rents Could Skyrocket 9.5% [NYP]
· Fresh Meat Thrown to Dogs in Annual Rent War [Curbed]

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Every year around this time, the Rent Guidelines Board begins proceedings to decide how to adjust the rates for rent-stabilized apartments. The decision comes every June, following numerous raucous public hearings in which landlord organizations claim they're being screwed because the rent doesn't keep up with the costs of maintaining the buildings, and tenant groups claim they're being screwed because the fatcat landlords are just greedy pigs. There is lots of yelling and sign waving, and the scene has more scripted drama than, well, Rent. And every June, the Rent Guidelines Board raises rents more than the tenants would like, and less than the landlords desired. The Post commemorates this year's kick-off with a pair of stories, one for each side. For the landlords, the Rent Guidelines Board announced that operating costs of rent-stabilized buildings jumped 7.8% from last year, a sure sign that rents could be raised more than the 3% for one-year renewals and 5.75% for two-year renewals that were agreed upon last year, when costs jumped 5.1%. For tenants, Congressman Anthony Weiner is leading the charge to demand more affordable housing, releasing a study that claims one-third of all New Yorkers pay more than 50% of their salary to their rent, when an acceptably amount is 30%. Commence shouting.
· Renters Face Bigger Hikes [NYP]
· 1 in 3 Give Half Pay to Landlords [NYP]

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NYU's wild visions for its massive expansion effort are finally receiving the reaction from Greenwich Village residents that we expected: Total. Fucking. Panic. Do check in with the Villager's story on the March 13th meeting between NYU and residents of the four-building Washington Square Village complex. NYU has several potential plans for the superblock just south of Washington Square Park—the four buildings (two on West Third Street and two on Bleecker Street) are separated by a lawn and playground built on top of a parking garage—some of which can be seen above. One potential scenario involves the demolition of the existing buildings and restoring the original street grid, a proposal not looked very fondly upon by the assembled rent-regulated tenants. Some color from the madness:

"Nazi tactics," charged one resident, adding, "I'm not calling you a Nazi, I'm saying the tactics your are using are Nazi." Hurley was indignant but restrained at that comment, but when another resident said the meeting was "a waste of time" and intended only to "razzle tenants," Hurley suggested that anyone who agreed should leave the meeting. No one made a move to go.

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First the Trinity School and now the Brearley School—those posh uptown private schools just can't stop screwing with rent-stabilized apartment dwellers! Brearley, on the Upper East Side, is expanding by purchasing the 12-story rear tower of 85 East End Avenue (right) and sticking classrooms in it. The school is giving the tenants the boot, because state law allows buildings owned by charitable or educational institutions to do just that. The residents lawyered up when rumors of of Brearley's interest in the building started spreading, and the school has promised to relocate the rent-regulated tenants. To where, well, that's a mystery. Hey, we hear nice things about Sunset Park!
· School to Boot Apt. Tenants [NYP]
· Dying Breed on the Upper West Side Just About Dead [Curbed]

Yesterday, along Manhattan's tony Park Avenue, the biggest real estate scandal of our time came to a close. A sheriff showed up at the front door of Bianca Jagger's $4,600-a-month rent-stabilized apartment and evicted the 62-year-old former wife of rock royalty, a move we've known was coming for some time. Bianca, of course, was not there, having given up the apartment as her primary residence—and thus, creating the no-no and the public outrage that followed—a few years ago. And so, the diamond-flecked sidewalks of Park Avenue are safe once again from the wealthy foreigners who dare take advantage of a little-overseen system by clinging to their outrageously-priced (but not outrageously outrageously-priced) apartments. Once a banker paying $30,000-a-month moves in, all order will be restored and our fair city can sleep comfortably once again.
· Bianca Gets Boot From Apt. [NYP]
· Rent Stabilization: Imagine the Alternative! [Curbed]

The Upper West Side may lose its last rent-subsidized Mitchell-Lama building, but the building's tenants are putting up a fight to save it. The Trinity School built the 200-unit building known as Trinity House on West 92nd Street near Columbus Avenue in 1968, and now the school wants to sell the building to a private developer who plans on exiting the Mitchell-Lama program and taking the building condo. Current tenants who can't afford to buy will be given rent-stabilized deals until they move out or croak, but apparently that's not good enough to quell the storm. Adding a touch of the awkward to the proceedings is the fact that a few dozen Trinity School faculty members reside in the building (Trinity would retain ownership of their units but the rent would get jacked up), which explains the not-quite-angry-enough protest signs seen in the Sun's photo at right. "Consult your neighbors?" Math problems? No wonder they're losing this battle.
· School Moves to Sell Its Middle-Class Housing [NYT]
· Trinity School Plans for Apartment Building Are Resisted [Sun]

Landlords harassing tenants is nothing new around these parts. In fact, it's rather textbook. Oddly, however, some see the shutting off of heat and hot water and general dereliction of landlordly duties as something that should be punished, rather than laughed off as part of the wacky New York rental scene. Weird! The Village Voice has an interesting update on the landlord-tenant rent wars penned by Tom Robbins, who focuses on two bills soon to be discussed by the city council's housing and buildings committee. One, introduced by speaker Christine Quinn, would allow tenants to cite landlords for harassment, which would be covered under the city's housing-maintenance code. The other bill is similar, but would in turn allow landlords to sue tenants for their own harassment. Whoa now! That would be a little scary.
· Slumming for Landlords [VV]

[Screw Rent photo via lopolis/Flickr]

Often times, landlords will come to us and say, "Curbed, I just bought a Brooklyn building with low-income, rent-regulated tenants. What's the easiest way for me to kick them out and bring in white Pratt graduates?" Until now, advice on this matter has been scattered, but one Sunset Park landlord—Jack Geula—has helpfully compiled a comprehensive how-to guide on the matter. Per the Daily News, here's Geula's checklist:

1) Serve eviction notices unprompted and without cause. This is an easy way to quickly root out the weak ones who won't, or don't know how, to put up a fight.

2) Make no repairs to the building, even when a roof collapses on a baby's crib. This one's a no-brainer, and has been in the slumlord playbook for a long time. Stick with it, even if an innocent child or two has to die along the way.

3) Turn off the heat and hot water for days at a time. Perhaps the best way to break the will of your adversaries.

4) Gently plant the seed of moving in the tenants' heads. When a tenant confronted Geula about the lack of repairs, he reportedly said, "If you don't like it you can move." Very well played, although we might have added an "asshole!" at the end.

You see? Follow these simple steps, and like Guela, you too will be able to evict up to half of your downtrodden Section 8 tenants in just one year's time!
· Brooklyn tenant fights off eviction, other families have been forced out [NYDN]

Using the plight of Bianca Jagger as a launching pad, the Observer's Tom Acitelli weighs in on the current trend of dissing rent control. He points out that market-rate rentals outnumber stabilized ones over two to one, so it's not like landlords are being forced into a life of poverty. And if they are, the state offers hardship benefits. So what's with all the haters? He writes:

Mostly, objection to rent stabilization stems from that unexamined contempt for an imagined class of freeloading rich people working the system: that someone with the means to pay market rate will land in an apartment—sometimes an opulent apartment—with an artificially low rent that’s likely to last for that person’s lifetime. It’s almost impossible for landlords to turn an occupied stabilized apartment market-rate.

The story of Bianca Jagger's eviction from her rent-stabilized Park Avenue apartment has swept the city like a Southern California wildfire. Every media outlet or commentator that covers the topic all echo the same reaction: How in the hell did a wealthy person like Bianca Jagger hold on to a rent stabilized apartment on Park Avenue for two decades? The horror! The outrage! In fact, the Sun today ran a scathing op-ed on the topic, writing: "Ms. Jagger's case underscores the way that the price controls on rent benefit a lucky and privileged few at the expense of ordinary New Yorkers." Really? We tend to disagree.

The only thing better than landing a rent-stabilized apartment is living there forever and ever, eating caviar from tiny silver spoons while your friends and neighbors scrimp and save so that they may slurp straight out of the lo mein carton. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work that way. A Curbed reader writes,

We live in a rent stabilized apartment and are wondering about when stabilization runs out? I've heard that when your annual rent goes over $2k / month the stabilization is removed? Is that true? If so, is it the lease after your rent hits that amount, or the lease when hits that amount? i.e. We just signed a lease for 1 yr. that puts us at approx. $1900 a month (2.5 bedroom in the EV) - so next year we will exceed that amount. So if the aforementioned lease de-stabilization limit is true - are we out next year? Or if we sign a 2 year lease next year are we out in 3 years? Or can we sit here as long as we want? - also - the building itself is no longer under stabilization - new leaseholders are paying market rates ($1k+ more then we are paying).

[Photo via the Gotham Gazette]

At left, a picture of 47 East 3rd Street from the tenants' website. At right, a picture of 47 East 3rd Street from the landlords' website. Same building, two views (see what we did there?). The battle over the building rages on, and when we last left it, the owners scored a victory in their fight to evict the holdouts tenants so that they can convert the entire building into a single-family megamansion for personal use. The latest, per the Villager, is a big rally outside the building last weekend, which featured advocates and politicians speaking out against the landlords. Said Manhattan borough prez Scott Stringer, “It’s not personal use. It’s personnel eviction, and we all know it.” Burn! Lost in this debate are the young children of the owners, who will grow up and Google their parents and wonder why so many people think they're assholes.
· Tenants are united under one roof to fight against eviction [Villager]
· East Village Mansion Dreams Fulfilled? [Curbed]
· Mansion Dreams on East 3rd [Curbed]

Tribeca fans know that developer Leviev Boymelgreen's 88 Leonard Street will open soon, but do they know that there's still a chance to snag one of the luxury rental building's 352 apartments—at a discounted price? We stumbled across this Craigslist ad that talks about 18 below-market-rate units set aside in the building, a requirement of the Liberty Bond Program. All you have to do to snag one of the $1,993 one-bedroom apartments is make an annual salary between $66,433 and $85,050, jump through a bunch of hoops and beat out 1,999 other people. Cake! The eligibility and application PDFs are located on the aptly titled 88LeonardLottery.com website. Feeling lucky?
· 88 Leonard Lottery [88leonardlottery.com]
· $1993 / 1br - Luxury apts in New Tribeca Building at below market rates [Craigslist]
· Development Du Jour: 88 Leonard [Curbed]

There's a new chapter in the long, long saga of the tenement building at 47 East 3rd Street. If your memory doesn't extend all the way back to Spring Break '05, the owners of the building headed to court in an effort to evict the tenants of the 15-unit walkup, so that they could convert the five-floor building into a mansion for their family. The tenants argued that the law stating that landlords can seize rent stabilized units if they will be used for personal use shouldn't apply, do to the size of the building. Got that? Well, now a state appeals court has ruled that the Economakis family can go to Housing Court and proceed with the evictions, a bad sign for the holdout tenants. In the meantime, the family will start moving in. That should make for some deliciously awkward hallway chatter with the neighbors.
· East Village eviction case kicked back to city court [NYDN]
· Landlord Wins Ruling in Eviction Case [NYSun]
· Mansion Dreams on East 3rd [Curbed]