Rent-Stabilized Tenant's Daughter Gets Apartment

Rent-stabilized tenant's daughter filed a lease violation complaint, claiming that landlord refused to offer her a renewal lease after tenant died in October 2019. The daughter claimed succession rights and said she had moved into the apartment in November 2015 to care for the ailing tenant. Landlord claimed that the daughter hadn't primarily resided with tenant for two years before tenant died and only used tenant's address as a mailing address. The DRA ruled for tenant's daughter.

Landlord appealed and lost. Landlord claimed that the daughter lived in Delaware. But the DHCR pointed out various documents the daughter had submitted to the DRA. These included a written request in 2015 to add her name to tenant's lease; a letter the daughter wrote to SCRIE stating that she now lived with tenant; copies of the daughter's rental payments made on tenant's behalf; various personal checks dated since 2015 with the apartment address on the checks;; NY State identification card; voter registration card; medical insurance card; tax returns for 2016, 2017, and 2018; and a NYC clinic card with appointments scheduled in 2017 through 2020. The daughter's 2015 letter to landlord advised that she was moving back to the apartment to care for her mother and would be traveling to Delaware on weekends to work. 

Susan Marsh Associates: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. JN210009RO (4/13/21) [3-pg. doc.]