Landlord Can Charge Free Market Vacancy Rent

Tenant complained of a rent overcharge. Tenant claimed that landlord wasn't entitled to collect a free market vacancy rent when she moved into her hotel-stabilized unit in March 1983. The DHCR ruled that landlord couldn't collect a free market vacancy rent because prior tenant had been evicted and the Hotel Stabilization Code permits landlord to charge a free market rent only if prior tenant voluntarily vacated the apartment. Landlord claimed that the DHCR's decision was arbitrary and unreasonable. The court ruled against landlord. Landlord appealed and won. To support her claim that prior tenant had been evicted, tenant had submitted a notice of termination dated August 1982. This notice, by itself, wasn't enough to prove that prior tenant had actually been evicted. So landlord was allowed to charge tenant a vacancy rent.

Ansonia Assocs. LP v. DHCR: NYLJ, 8/18/03, p. 19, col. 2 (App. Div. 1 Dept.; Nardelli, JP, Tom, Andrias, Lerner, JJ)