DHCR Changes Rent Set for Rent-Controlled Tenant from $184 to $759

In 2013, tenant asked the DHCR to determine his rent regulatory status after landlord started an eviction proceeding against him, claiming that tenant was unregulated. Tenant claimed that he was rent controlled and that landlord and tenant had signed a settlement agreement in housing court where landlord acknowledged tenant’s rent-controlled status. Tenant claimed that the only remaining question was the amount of tenant’s legal rent. Tenant moved into the apartment in 1968 at a monthly rent of $100. The DRO set the Maximum Collectible Rent (MCR) as $184.13 effective Jan. 1, 1985. Landlord appealed and lost before the DHCR, then filed an Article 78 court appeal. The court sent the case back to the DHCR for reconsideration. The DHCR noted that an order issued in 1976 set the Maximum Base Rent (MBR) for the apartment as $159.33. Considering that, along with the equities involved, the DHCR set the current MBR and MCR at $759.31 as of Jan. 1, 2011. The DHCR found that this rent set a fair balance between tenant’s right to be rent controlled at a reasonable rent and landlord’s need for an appropriate present-day rent for purposes of maintaining the apartment and the building.

Summer Realty Corp.: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. DM220003RP (3/11/16) [9-pg. doc.]