A Bronx judge recently postponed a controversial rent hike planned for the Tracey Towers housing complex. The complex was built in 1974 through the Mitchell-Lama affordable housing program. According to statements made by the tenant organization president, the tenants regularly deal with heat and hot water problems, broken elevators, and rodents, and they allege that […]
Elected officials, including Borough President Scott Stringer, State Sen. Daniel Squadron, and Council Speaker Christine Quinn, recently pledged their support for the tenants of TriBeCa’s Independence Plaza North, who are fighting for their apartments to become rent stabilized. The officials recently filed court documents arguing that the 1,331-unit complex, which was built as affordable housing […]
A New York City rabbi who was fired as a Correction Department chaplain for arranging a lavish jailhouse bar mitzvah in 2009 has pleaded guilty to making false statements in connection to a federal housing scheme. Rabbi Leib Glanz and his brother were charged last year with theft and conspiracy for stealing $220,000 in Section […]
A New York State Supreme Court judge recently granted class action status to a group of nine tenants in a Turtle Bay building. They claim that their landlord illegally deregulated 72 apartments. According to the complaint, the owner charged tenants market-rate rents for 20 years, even though he received J-51 tax breaks from the city. […]
A lesbian couple in New York City recently scored a victory when their building’s owner and management company agreed to comply with city and state laws and put both women’s names on the lease for their rent-stabilized Harlem apartment. The named tenant had sought to add her spouse’s name to the lease after the couple […]
The Upper West Side third-floor walk-up where President Obama lived while attending Columbia University recently became available to rent. It’s listed at $2,400 a month, which is a significant increase from the $360 President Obama paid with his roommate in the early 1980s. According to the listing, the apartment is a third-floor walk-up with exposed […]
Don’t wait till you’re hit with a rent overcharge complaint to get your old lease files in order. That’s the advice of New York City attorney Erez Glambosky, partner at Rivkin Radler LLP, who warns, “Since the 2010 Court of Appeals decision in Grimm v. DHCR, if a tenant submits a ‘colorable claim of fraud’ […]
The Environmental Control Board (ECB) recently ruled that a landlord could be fined for failing to maintain a water meter in a readily accessible area. Furthermore, the rules don’t require the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to give landlord prior notice that a water meter will be read. In July 2011, a DEP inspector called […]
When Marshall Cox moved into graduate housing at Columbia University, he immediately ran into a problem that many New York City residents suffer: His apartment was too hot. He couldn’t adjust his radiator because all of the heat for the building came from a single steam generator. So the only way he could get some […]
FBI agents recently arrested five more people in a widening probe of corruption allegations involving New York City government housing preservation officials. One city official and a former city employee were among those arrested on a variety of corruption charges. The five will be arraigned in Brooklyn federal court. The most recent arrests mark the […]
