Tenants Can Throw the Book at Landlords for Harassment
A new law will make it more difficult for the Joshua Guttmans and Joel Weiners of the world to avoid their day in court. Yesterday Mayor Bloomberg signed a bill that gives tenants the right to take naughty landlords to Housing Court. Renters can now bring offending landlords to court for patterns of harassment that…
A new law will make it more difficult for the Joshua Guttmans and Joel Weiners of the world to avoid their day in court. Yesterday Mayor Bloomberg signed a bill that gives tenants the right to take naughty landlords to Housing Court. Renters can now bring offending landlords to court for patterns of harassment that more or less boil down to trying to give tenants the heave-ho. The law makes harassment a violation subject to fines of between $1,000 and $5,000. While we believe that the vast majority of landlords throughout the city are responsible and do not engage in tenant harassment, we cannot turn our backs on the bad actors who participate in such behavior, said Mayor Bloomberg. The Rent Stabilization Association, a landlord group, opposed the law. In light of all of the existing remedies that are available to tenants and in light of the failure of any of the bill’s supporters to document or establish any patterns of harassment in the City of New York or any systematic harassment, it leads one to question what the motives behind this legislation really are, said Mitchell Posilkin, the association’s general counsel.
City Passes New Law to Limit Tenant Harassment [NY Observer]
Tenants Gain Right to Sue Landlords for Harassment [City Room]
Stencil by redrum
The truth is, no matter what laws are put into place, the fact that rentals are so in demand and that there are a lot of people with a lot of money in New York, means that conditions are in favor of landlords.
For example, if anyone were to bring their evil, harassing landlord to court, they wouldn’t be able to list the landlord as a reference for future rentals. They might even be blacklisted by the landlord, affecting their chances of getting rentals in the future.
Apartments are so quick to go in this city, it’s not hard for landlords to find another potential tenant if you ask for major improvements or concessions before signing the lease. Also, the rental process is so un-transparent that you would never know if you had been discriminated against in their choice (it’s not first-come, first-served). Landlords can increase the rent unreasonably between tenants; I can’t believe there are no rent stabilization laws that apply to all rentals.
As long as the market favors landlords, they will be able to get away with nearly whatever they want. They have power because of high demand, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I have only ever heard of one good landlord out of everyone I know, in my time living here.
Ms Sandy,
You can both evict and get back rent. If a judgement is entered against the tenant, you can then pursue the collection of back rent through a collection agency or on your own.
9:55:
“Brooklynnative, 9:25—Landlords have a remedy for what you describe. It’s called eviction. Also, when a prime tenant is found guilty of rent gouging a subtenant, the subtenant can sue for treble damages.”
Nice try but no cigar. Brooklynnative, asked what recourse does the LANDLORD have. Eviction doesn’t get your money back – people misunderstand this. You either can sue to get your money back or get the person out. If the tenant pays, they get to stay. If you get them out, you lose your money.
As for the subtenant suing for treble damages – again that doesn’t benefit the LANDLORD who can’t rent the apartment for market rent because the tenant is doing that. The name for someone who wants to rent apartments and make a profit is called a LANDLORD.
Brooklynnative: I have the same question. If you get an answer, let me know…
So there is a landlord advocacy group called the RENT STABILIZATION ASSOCIATION? I thought the landlords hated rent stabilization laws.
Wait… Can this be retroactive? About two years ago I had THE WORST living arrangement that involved a landlord that harrassed me CONSTANTLY. See, she lived on the ground floor of the building (my boyfriend and I occupied the third floor) and would pry out her window just waiting for us to come home – no joke. (She didn’t work). She would then always come outside and start yelling at us for ANYTHING she could think of – having friends over, taking out our garbage too much, coming home too late – and to top it off, she would yell at any friends of mine that I had invited over before they could get inside, telling them they were trespassing and she was going to call the cops on them unless they got off her property. She filed for eviction (after we had been there 2 months) which we won, though we did not stay there (we won all our rent + security deposit back, save our first month’s rent). She actually told the court that we were running a brothel because we had men coming in and out all the time and they must have been having sex with me.
Also, she was extremely racist, and had told us that no black people were allowed in her building, and when a black friend of mine came over she threatened to call the cops becasue he was “going to steal from her”.
SO, I would really, really like to sue this woman, for making my life a living hell for 5 months. Unfortunately, when we tried to bring these incidents up in court we were told that unless we could prove mental anguish (psych bills) we had no case. I’m sorry, but that’s just not right. she got away with such harassment and she should pay.
guest, 9:09—Tenants do have the right to take landlords to housing court for things like lack of heat, failure to make repairs, etc., but in some cases they have to go back multiple times because the landlord is trying to systematically force them from the building. This is an attempt to correct that situation.
Brooklynnative, 9:25—Landlords have a remedy for what you describe. It’s called eviction. Also, when a prime tenant is found guilty of rent gouging a subtenant, the subtenant can sue for treble damages.
The importent thing is that tenants that sue freviously under this law are subject to fines as well.
How about a law allowing landlords to sue tenants for lost rent when tenants sublet their rent stablized apartments for a profit or when they do not use it as their primary adress?
well more power to the communist. the bad landlords will always get away with things