Received my rent history... please help me assess

[CercleRouge]

I just received the rent history of my current apartment and I'd love some opinions on whether or not it was legally destabilized.

I'm just going to list the last few years, I'm slightly altering the rent here on the off chance that a landlord is reading this.

2008: $1818 (plus some change)
2009: $1873
2010: $1957
2011: $2016
2012: $2016
2013: $2016 (not sure why it stays the same 3 years in a row)
2014: EXEMPT HIGH RENT VACANCY
2015: EXEMPT APARTMENT - REG NO REQUIRED

So what do we think? Clearly the numbers come close to being reasonably destabilized, but I'd love some other opinions. Thank you!

[CercleRouge]

(I moved in this year)

[TenantNet]

Start here: http://www.nyshcr.org/Rent/factsheets/orafac26.pdf

There are two common means of deregulation, high rent and high income deregulation.

The High Rent deregulation trigger was $2,000 for many years, then it was changed to $2,500 in 2011 and again to $2,700 in 2015.

The amounts you indicated above, I'm assuming that is what's listed on DHCR registrations, so they are not preferential rents.

It's possible the 2011 rent was $2016 before the change in the trigger level to $2500. But maybe it wasn't. But if they didn't claim deregulation in 2011, I don't know if they can make the claim in later years using the $2,000 trigger. If they claim dereg in 2014, then it seems to me they have to show the unit exceeded $2,500 at that time.

And without further investigation, one can't know why it stayed the same for three years.

One question I have is how did it get to $1818 in the first place?

For the last two entries, that's what the LL is telling DHCR. That is not DHCR's determination.

If you just moved in, I would poke around some more. Can you reach the last tenant? Do neighbors know how to reach the last tenant? See how long he/she lived there and the real rent history.

Eventually you can file with DHCR, but I'd get more information from other sources first.

[CercleRouge]

Thanks for the info. So if an apartment reaches the destabilization threshold in the middle of a tenancy, does the landlord typically file for destabilization right then and there, or do they usually wait until that tenancy ends?

So I guess the question is... in order for a landlord to destabilize an apartment, does the high rent threshold have to be crossed AND a tenancy has to end in order for destabilization to take place?

The tenant right before me (all tenants names are listed here, this is the most complete DHCR sheet I've seen) was only here for one year, and their rent was $100 less than mine according to both StreetEasy and the broker. However before that was a tenant who moved in in 1997. The prior tenant also had preferential rent (always less than $100 of legal rent - both legal and preferential rates are listed) until 2003.

So far my landlord is quite nice... as far as I know this is the only building she owns. She inherited it from an aunt fairly recently. This is my first market-rate apartment so I don't want to do anything that's going to prevent me from getting future lease renewals. I've always had RS apartments before this.

Thanks again.

[TenantNet]

You're talking High Rent Decontrol, not High Income. That can not happen in the middle of a lease. The official DHCR Fact Sheet is undergoing revisions, but you can see the old one here: http://rsanyc.net/assets/documents/pdf/orafac36.pdf. So even if your rent reaches the trigger, you won't be deregulated or evicted for that reason alone.

However, this isn't about you; it's about the prior tenant. And there was a vacancy before you took occupancy.

There's even a court case (Altman) winding its way through the appeal process that if upheld, would determine that a unit can't be destabilized until the second vacancy. That's because most of the time when the rent gets to be higher than the trigger point, it happens during a vacancy. But the rent doesn't go up when the prior tenant vacates; instead, it really goes up when a new tenant signs a new lease and takes occupancy. And when that happens, it can only be deregulated on the next vacancy after that one.

I would never trust any site like Street Easy. They are notoriously inaccurate.

Whether or not you make a fuss is up to you, but consider the level of an illegal increase. If only a few dollars, that's one thing. But several hundred dollars, that makes a big difference. And RS status has a lot more protections than just the rent level.