Monday, September 4, 2017

Anti-landlord harassment bills signed

From AM-NY:

New York City landlords will face up to $5,000 in fines if they are found to be illegally harassing tenants under a package of tenant-protection bills signed into law Wednesday by Mayor Bill de Blasio.

The new set of laws increases the minimum harassment fine levied on landlords from $1,000 to $2,000, and increases the penalty to $5,000 for landlords already cited for tenant harassment in the past five years. The measures also expand the city’s definition of tenant harassment to include calls and visits by the landlord at “unusual hours.”

The bills also look to prevent landlords from prolonging construction and demolition projects in an effort to pressure tenants out of their apartments. The city’s Department of Buildings will issue completion deadlines when landlords seek building permits for projects in occupied buildings, and will increase its inspection of construction and demolition projects in occupied buildings.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

The DOB is gonna set a timeline thats a joke, they can not even handle there work load now and cause delays on just about all construction projects in the city. Instead of hiring more inspectors and plan approvers they will fine owners.

Anonymous said...

What about lousy tenants clogging toilets, smashing walls, tossing garbage out the window, stinking up the hose smoking dope, kids riding bikes in hallways and harassing landlords every which way possible ?
Why all these fines, harassment & hostility buy the city toward hard working home owners ?

(sarc) said...

Second anonymous poster,

You must learn to embrace "diversity"...

Anonymous said...


What about lousy tenants clogging toilets, smashing walls, tossing garbage out the window, stinking up the hose smoking dope, kids riding bikes in hallways and harassing landlords every which way possible ?

And don't forget - Changing locks without notice, not paying the rent, and taking fixtures and appliances when they move out.

Why all these fines, harassment & hostility buy the city toward hard working home owners ?

Because society in general sees the Landlord/Homeowner as a Scrooge.

Anonymous said...

It really sucks that the irresponsible and sometimes outright evil of big landlords - the ones with the connections to get away with anything - lead to increasingly onerous laws that make it impossible for small landlords to prosper, or even get by. The family renting out grandma's old apartment to make a little extra money will suffer from these sort of rules.

Anonymous said...

The plan is to drive all tax paying land owners out
and give it to the developers to build homeless shelters & sec8

Rob in Manhattan said...

For those of you whose misguided hearts bleed for landlords, read this:

http://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2017/09/6/nyc-rising-retail-rents-series-part-one.html

As a business owner, I and my partners have faced this situation multiple times over the 32 years of my involvement. A landlord does absolutely -nothing- in the case of a commercial space. The entire envelope of our operation is our responsibility. They simply wait like jackals for lease expiration and demand whatever their greed guides them to --or simply discard all you have worked for and all those you employ.

Although this is a commercial example, the situation is not much different for residential tenants. Even with rent regulation, there is a relentless rent increase that eventually overwhelms many people and forces them to leave the city and give up the life they enjoyed. They often lose everything; job, friends, their lives.

All so that some parasite can temporarily sate their greed.

...And save us that "hard working owner" bullshit -I know too many of them to swallow that. These people are vermin.

JQ LLC said...

Hear, hear Rob in Manhattan. These people aren't only vermin, they are virtually traitors destroying the American Dream and The Pursuit Of Happiness.

There are plenty of good, responsible landlords too that give a damn about community and fairness, I have had a few that gave me a bit of slack to catch up to paying rent when I was being screwed by my employers. The people Rob there refers to are what I call "scumlords" a amalgam of landlord, slumlord and scumbag.