Court Applies Law Retroactively to Find Apartment Was Improperly Deregulated

Landlord sued to evict unregulated tenant after tenant's lease expired. Tenant claimed that he was rent stabilized and had been overcharged. The court ruled for tenant. Rent Stabilization Law (RSL) Section 26-511(c)(14), as amended effective June 15, 2015, requires that the rent prior to a vacancy exceed $2,500 in order for the next tenant to be deregulated. Tenant moved into the apartment before the law changed, on May 1, 2015, at a monthly rent of $1,650, and the prior tenant's last rent-stabilized rent was $2,138 with a preferential rent of $1,500. Landlord claimed that the applicable vacancy increase of 18.25 percent raised tenant's legal rent to over $2,500, and therefore tenant was properly deregulated. But the court found that the legislature intended to retroactively apply the amendment to the RSL to apartments that became vacant before the effective date of the statute. So tenant remained rent stabilized since prior tenant's legal rent was less than $2,500.

517 West 212 St LLC v. Musik-Ayala: 2017 NY Slip Op 2l7398, 2017 WL 6030451 (Civ. Ct. NY; 12/1/17; Stoller, J)