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April 21, 2008

Advice - how to safeguard my rights ? Demolition/dev. to begin next door

Last week we received notice of demolition which will be taking place directly next to our house in Crown Heights.

The gossip on the street is that this double lot house/vacant space will be developed into medium rise condominiums.

How can I find out what the developers plans are, and how can I be sure that they do not overbuild ? Are there proactive steps that I should be taking now – such as taking pictures of the exterior of my house etc. etc. ? Who should I turn to for advice – a RE lawyer ? An Architect ?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Comments

Here's a non-definitive, non-authoritative list of things to consider doing do now.

Take "before" pictures, inside your building and out. If your walls start cracking, you want to be able to show the condition was not preexisting. Figure out if there is anything unique to the site (a leaning building, for example) that you want to make sure they are aware of before they start.

Monitor the project on the Buildings Department's website. See what applications have been filed and/or approved and what permits have been issued (bookmark the DOB page, you will be visiting it often). Note who the owners, architect, and any permit holders are. You want to kow how deep they will be digging next to your property and what precautions they plan to take, as well as what the plan to build.

Once they start, take progress photos of what is going on at the site.

For extra credit, do some online research to see if any of the players on the project hae had problems elsewhere. You can do an owner search on the City's ACRIS database to find out what other properties the owner has owned and then you can look those up on DOB's website to see if there was work on those properties and whether there were problems.

As for lawyers, you want one that has represented homeowners against developers in this context. A RE lawyer who only does transactions doesn't really cut it. You may want to consult one in advance just to make sure you are being diligent, but there is nothing really for a lawyer to do unless something goes wrong.

Do all this as a matter of due diligence, but don't come out guns ablazing. Talk to the owner either by phone or whenever you see someone in charge at the site. Try to develop a positive, or at least cordial, relationship in the first instance. You don't know enough yet to know whether there is anything you think the owner or contractor is doing wrong, so there is no reason to make the relationship adversarial. Find out what they are planning and ask to see the plans.

All of this is in the nature of being prepared in case something does go wrong, because it can be a mess to deal with later.

Posted by: slopefarm at April 21, 2008 2:01 PM

agreed. and overbuilding is not really your biggest concern. Your foundation sliding and your walls cracking when they start digging (and you possibly being ordered to live elsewhere until your building is patched up because it isn't deemed safe for you to reside there) are your biggest concerns.

Posted by: guest at April 21, 2008 2:36 PM

Thanks slopefarm for the thoughtful post.

Posted by: guest at April 21, 2008 3:27 PM

This has been very helpful. Thank you ! I looked on ACRIS and the owner is named as the actual street address - for example 333 (Street Name) Inc. No name is on file in the deed etc. Im not sure how to find out who the players were in this case...I will certainly begin to take the fotos. I think it is good to be prepared for all scenarios, for this reason I want to be as prepared as possible.

Posted by: crownheights2007 at April 21, 2008 3:49 PM

OP, if you look on ACRIS, you may also see a mortgage issued to the owner. If you have the block and lot, do a search for all docs (i.e., don't limit it to deeds). If the mortgage is fairly recent, you should see a .pdf attached. There are likely to be some real people in those mortgage docs.

Developers often create new legal entities for each property so you won't technically have the same owner for any other properties. But once you have some names from the mortgage, you can try punching those in to a name search on ACRIS and see what you get.

Also, click on all the DOBs' website for any open job listed at the property. You may find some names there as well, if you noodle around enough.

Posted by: slopefarm at April 21, 2008 4:02 PM

In both of my houses major construction took place directly adjacent to the property. In one instance an entirely new house was built, foundation and all, and in the other, the house next door was gutted from roof to basement. Take pictures, yes, just to be on the safe side, but in neither instance was my house affected in the slightest and i just mention this because more likely than not yours won't be either. The worst of it was the noise and dust.

Posted by: herkimer at April 21, 2008 4:21 PM

Getting 5 day notices in the mail for the demo is a good start. They should have notified your community board as well. I hope the Demo contractor isn't MMG contracting!
Concerns:
Is your house attached to the one they are demo'ing? They will need to waterproof if yes. Depending on how tall the building is they may or may not be able to use mechanical means to bring down the house. There is supposed to be dust mitigation with water by law.

Call the B.E.S.T. squad for demo complaints AND 311.

The DOB BIS page will be your best source of info. You should get phone numbers off the job applications. Sometimes even cell phone numbers of the GC.

The best advice I can give is to try and open up a dialog as soon as possible with the developer that is not adversarial. Keeping the channels open is the key.

Posted by: guest at April 22, 2008 9:17 AM

We had the same situation only the person next door would need access to our backyard and walkway. I asked him to place $10,000 in an escrow account in case my property was damaged. I also asked that he name my property on his construction insurance so that if his workers damaged anything in my yard it would be covered. Lastly since his workers were working in my walkway on scaffolding, etc. I asked that I be held harmless for any injuries that resulted on my property. As someone else pointed out the worse thing that happened was the dust and debris. Luckily I had a very, very nice family building next door and it all worked out well.

Posted by: guest at April 22, 2008 11:28 AM

keep your fingers crossed it is not owned by a shell corporation offshore in a place like curacao.

If that is the case, you will never find out the owners name.

Posted by: Ysabelle at April 23, 2008 12:21 AM

Curacao is beautiful. The capital city is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Posted by: guest at April 23, 2008 8:00 AM

To guest 8am
Yes, Curacao it is beautiful.

If you need to find the owner of an offshore corporation. It is never going to happen.

They have stong secrecy laws to protect owners of any business which makes it difficult to colect money.

Offshore companies is a huge source of income for the island.

Posted by: Ysabelle at April 23, 2008 10:59 AM