From the NY Times:The Department of Buildings has begun issuing fines to agents and brokers who advertise and show illegal apartments for rent, a new step in a long battle that has traditionally taken on owners of illegal dwellings. The fines, which have been issued to the agents and the companies they work for, begin at $3,600 and can go up to five times that amount.
“They are the people in the middle in many cases, the licensed salesperson and the broker,” said the buildings commissioner, Robert D. LiMandri. “They are the enabler. We have to hold them accountable, too.”
From January to March, inspectors combed through listing Web sites like craigslist, and then, posing as curious potential renters, went to see 50 apartments they considered suspicious. (Telltale signs of an apartment without the proper certificate of occupancy might be a listing that says all utilities are included, for example.)
The department issued fines to 10 agents, including agents at Douglas Elliman and Halstead Property, for listing apartments in a variety of neighborhoods and boroughs, including Park Slope and Brighton Beach in Brooklyn, and Hamilton Heights in Upper Manhattan. All of the apartments were in the basement or the cellar, and most did not have the required two means of egress, the department said. The department says the building code gives it the right to issue fines to agents; in the future, it may go after brokers who supervise the agents as well.
Spokesmen for Douglas Elliman and Halstead Property declined to comment.
This investigation, which the department theatrically calls, “Operation: Danger Included,” is not its first foray into undercover work. In 2010, it began a similar sting operation, looking for illegal apartments and fining the landlords. The crackdown continued last month as a landlord in Queens was charged with reckless endangerment for cramming nearly 50 people into converted apartments, including in garages and cellars.
“Frankly, illegal conversions can kill you,” Mr. LiMandri said. “It’s very simple to go on our Web site and figure out if it’s an illegal apartment or not.”
5 comments:
Are you going to be scoping Queens for these kind of illegal apartments...or just the yuppie-puppy enclaves in Manhattan and Brooklyn?
C'mon...Flushing, for example, is the epicenter for devious Oriental brokers pushing illegal basement conversions.
Or does DOB not want to offend the Asiatics?
I agree Flushing real estate must be investigated for illegal conversions too. You will have to read all the local papers in many different languages. I would also investigate the many Churches that pop up on almost every other block. They are just fronts for tax evasion.
Everyone living next door to or around a home that obviously has an illegal apartment should make an anonymous complaint to the DOB. Inundate the DOB and get the addresses on record.
Bayside is full of illegal basement apartments. In some instances, it is extremely obvious.
For instance, a two-family house with three sets of meters.
This is why our schools are so so so overcrowded in Bayside.
Cracking down? My ass crack!
It'll be business as usual at the DOB, after taking a slight recess, from putting up a show.
Bribery and collusion
are what Li Mandri's boys are best at.
Go after the owners and shut down the dwellings that illegal - pour resources in DOB - get them teeth to shut down firetraps - send illegal home instead of illegal apartments.
Post a Comment