Rent Overcharge Properly Determined Using Default Method

Tenant complained to the DHCR in October 2019 of rent overcharge and improper apartment deregulation. Landlord claimed that the apartment was vacancy deregulated in 2014, before tenant moved into the unit in 2017. The DRA ruled for tenant based on landlord's failure to submit a base date lease or rent ledger. The DRA therefore set the base date rent by applying the default formula by subtracting the statutory vacancy increase in effect when tenant moved in from tenant's initial rent. The resulting legal regulated rent was $1,845 per month. Tenant therefore was rent stabilized, and the total overcharge awarded was $24,400, including triple damages.

Landlord appealed and lost. It is not a defense to an overcharge proceeding that the landlord didn't have base date rental records. And any claim that an apartment wasn't subject to rent regulation didn't relieve landlord from producing a base date rent record. Landlord also failed to submit any proof of how the apartment was deregulated. 

274 East 3rd LLC: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. MO410016RO (12/3/24)[3-pg. document]