No Proof of Rent Fraud Claimed by Tenant

Tenant complained of a rent overcharge. The DRA dismissed the complaint, finding that tenant’s apartment had been deregulated more than four years before tenant filed his complaint in 2011. Tenant appealed and lost. The legal regulated rent exceeded $2,000 on March 1, 2005, and was deregulated by virtue of high-rent/vacancy deregulation. Tenant moved into the apartment in 2010 and paid $1,880 per month. Tenant claimed fraud based on a review of prior rent history records. But landlord had filed an exit registration at the time of annual rent registration in 2006, more than eight months before the four-year base date set by the filing of tenant’s complaint. It was unclear whether tenant could base a claim of fraud solely on prior rent increases without a further indication of any pattern or scheme by landlord. But the DHCR reviewed prior rent registrations and found nothing indicating any unusual rent increases prior to high-rent/vacancy deregulation in 2005.

White: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. AN410028RT (7/12/12) [7-pg. doc.]