Monday, August 25, 2008

Vantage neglecting rent controlled units?

Shoukat Ali of Jackson Heights made call after call for three weeks, pleading with his landlord to fix the "waterfall" raining down on his bathroom from a leaky pipe in the apartment above.

Tenants say owner Vantage Properties ignores pleas, yet still renovates

What happened next was almost inevitable.

Last Saturday, a large chunk of the ceiling crashed to the floor, flooding his bathroom with water and soggy drywall.

Several days after the catastrophe, his landlord, Vantage Properties, had yet to fix the gaping hole.

What makes the hardship even more frustrating, Ali said, is that Vantage recently remodeled a vacant apartment across the hallway and another in an adjacent, company-owned building.

Vantage, which owns roughly 5,000 rent-controlled units in some 80 buildings in northern Queens, has made headlines for allegedly harassing tenants in an effort to vacate units and rent them at market rates.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gee, where are all those afforadable housing folks that flood Willets Pt and Hunters Pt like a bunch of rats at a picnic.

Oh I see.

THEIR INTEREST IS ONLY MASSIVE NEW DEVELOPMENT.

Just like a pol or developer.

Funny.

Anonymous said...

Not all pols are for affordable housing. Its the politicians that rely on the "handout voter" and want to create more of them in their district.

i hate the fact that working people struggle to pay rent for small crappy 2-bedroom apts while the "entitled" poor get everything handed to them while my taxes go up.

Anonymous said...

I go through the same thing in my Pinnacle owned building in woodhaven. We moved in last winter and the place was totally renovated but they neglected to fix a leak in the bathroom upstairs so my ceiling leaks daily. My calls to the office go unanswered and the city inspectors never show up when they say they will.

Anonymous said...

Well perhaps the city wide preservation community should get involved.

There is more to the urban fabric of this city than restoring stoops, you nitwits.

Anonymous said...

Go on a rent strike with your money put into an escrow account.

There is a warrant of habitability
that all landlords must abide by!

Lead paint from falling ceilings,
endangering the health of their children, is a strong point for these tenants to make with the rent control board.

Anonymous said...

Don't give my landlord any ideas. He's already shut off half the water in my rent-stabilized apartment. Heated me, froze me, opening holes in every surface of my apartment and choked me with asbestos, lead and fiber-glass.

I can't wait to sign up with Vantage--the model landlords.

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