No Proof Landlord Gave Tenant Preferential Rent

Tenant complained of a rent overcharge. The DRA found no overcharge. Tenant paid $725 per month on the base rent date, and remained at all times since then as a month-to-month tenant with no rent-stabilized lease and no increase in his rent. The DRA directed landlord to offer tenant a renewal lease. And the DRA found that any issue about the fair market rent was moot because the apartment was decontrolled more than four years before tenant's complaint was filed. The DRA also found that landlord had legally collected two months' security deposit of $1,450.
Landlord appealed, claiming that the legal regulated rent was $1,450, not $725. Tenant paid $1,450 in security deposit when he moved in. Landlord claimed that he charged tenant a preferential rent of $725. Landlord claimed that the case should have been treated as a fair market rent appeal, and that there was no claim by tenant that his security deposit covered two months' rent. The DHCR ruled against landlord. Since the base date for purposes of tenant's complaint was June 15, 2003, the DHCR can't examine prior rent history records. At any rate, the April 1, 2001, lease that landlord submitted didn't provide for a rent of $1,450 as claimed by landlord. The lease provided for a rent of $725. So the security deposit represents two months' rent. The complaint also was properly processed as a rent overcharge claim because it was too late to file a fair market rent appeal.

185 PPW LLC: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. WC210002RO (7/3/08) [2-pg. doc.]