IAI Rent Increases Disallowed Without Written Tenant Consent

Landlord asked the DHCR in 2018 for a ruling on an apartment's rent regulation status and for amendment of the unit's 2014 and 2015 annual rent registrations based on its claim that the unit became permanently exempt from rent regulation due to substantial rehab in 2013. The DRA ruled against landlord, who appealed and lost. The DRA had disallowed any rent increase for individual apartment improvements (IAI) and rolled the apartment rent back to the Aug. 1, 2012, rent of $674.45. The DHCR noted that the apartment was occupied by tenant at the time the IAIs were performed and that no written consent to any rent increase had been signed by the tenant. And electrical work done in the apartment in 2009 was repair and maintenance work, not an IAI. Landlord also had failed to submit additional documentation of the claimed IAI costs that the DRA requested. Also, since the question involved here was the apartment's regulatory status, the four-year lookback period that would have applied at the time to an overcharge claim did not apply.

Zackmaxie, LLC: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. N210010RO (10/15/21)[4-pg. document]