RFAI Returned to DHCR Indicated Daughter Didn't Live in Apartment

An apartment occupant filed a lease violation complaint with the DHCR, claiming that she had lived in a rent-stabilized apartment since 1994 and that landlord failed to sign and return a renewal lease to her for the term commencing Jan. 1, 2022. That renewal lease was offered to occupant's mother as the rent-stabilized tenant, but the occupant had signed the renewal and returned it to landlord. Occupant also claimed that landlord had been accepting rent payments from her. Landlord answered that the occupant was tenant's daughter and had no rights to the apartment, and landlord had started an eviction proceeding against her. The DRA sent a copy of landlord's answer to the occupant and asked her for information to prove succession rights. Although addressed to occupant at the apartment, it was returned to the DHCR by the post office as "not deliverable as addressed -- unable to forward." The DRA ruled against occupant, terminated the proceeding, and found that she had vacated the apartment.

Occupant appealed and lost. She claimed that she continued to reside in former tenant's apartment and that she never received the DRA's Request for Additional Information (RFAI). She also claimed that tenant moved out in 2019 and that landlord knew this. But the returned RFAI indicated that occupant didn't live in the apartment, occupant didn't respond to a similar RFAI in a prior complaint she filed in 2020, and there was a pending eviction proceeding against occupant in housing court that would resolve the matter.

Rooke: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. MP210021RT (10/28/24)[2-pg. document]