No Rent Overcharge for Newly Combined SRO Rooms

SRO tenant complained of rent overcharge. Landlord claimed that tenant's unit was deregulated before tenant moved in and after landlord combined two adjacent rooms and set the legal rent at $2,000. The DRA ruled for tenant in part, finding that landlord failed to prove that the apartment was deregulated. The legal rent was set at $1,750 per month, which was the amount tenant had paid since the base date four years before he filed his complaint. So there was no overcharge. Tenant appealed and lost. Tenant claimed there was a pattern of fraud by landlord. The DHCR disagreed. Tenant always paid a rent that was below the deregulation threshold, and landlord hadn't increased tenant's rent in nearly 10 years. And since Room 519/520 didn't exist in 2003, tenant incorrectly claimed that a lower rent registered for Room 520 that year should be the base rent. 

Garg: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. ET410082RT (7/20/17) [5-pg. doc.]