Two Connected Apartments Counted as One for Luxury Decontrol

Landlord applied for high-rent/high-income deregulation of tenants' apartment. The DRA ruled for landlord. Tenants appealed, claiming that they rented two separate apartments, one to live in and one for professional use. They said the DRA incorrectly treated the two apartments as one to find that the rent was over $2,000 per month. The DHCR ruled against tenants. The two apartments were connected by an interior open doorway. This was more important than the fact that the apartments had separate leases, were first rented at different times, were registered separately, received separate rent bills, and had separately paid rents. An inspection had shown that the two apartments were used for residential purposes and were integrated into one unit. And while tenants claimed that they used one of the apartments only for professional purposes, there was no income-producing commercial activity there. One tenant, an actress, used the apartment to rehearse, and the other tenant, a professor, did job-related research and writing there.

Agostini: DHCR Admin. Rev. Dckt. No. PF410017RT (10/30/01) [5-pg. doc.]