Tenant's Untimely Fair Market Rent Appeal Was Properly Dismissed

Rent-stabilized tenant complained to the DHCR of rent overcharge. The DRA converted the complaint to a fair market rent appeal (FMRA) because it sought to challenge the rent initially charged to the first rent-stabilized tenant in January 2015 after the unit was no longer rent controlled. The DRA ruled against tenant and dismissed the complaint because her complaint was filed in December 2018, more than four years after the rent-controlled tenant moved out, and tenant's FMRA was therefore untimely.

Tenant appealed and lost. The DRA correctly found that the proceeding was an untimely FMRA under RSC Section 2522.3. Landlord's failure to send the first rent-stabilized tenant an initial RR-1 registration form or otherwise advise the first tenant of a change in the rent-regulated status of the apartment didn't extend the four-year deadline to file an FMRA. Tenant's claims of fraud and/or of unproven individual apartment improvements (IAIs) also didn't extend the time to file a FMRA. The four-year deadline applied since tenant's complaint was filed before passage of HSTPA in June 2019.

Schertz: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. LN410005RT (7/25/23)[6-pg. document]