Results tagged “rentguidelinesboard”

Last night, the Rent Guidelines Board voted to raise rents for rent-stabilized apartments: 3% for one-year leases and 6% for two-year leases. NY1 reports, "For tenants who have lived in their building for six or more years, the increase will be either $30 or $60, whichever is more."

The Rent Guidelines Board's annual carnival of cacophony—wherein hundreds of rent-stabilized tenants shout themselves hoarse as the board votes to raise their rents again—goes down tonight at Cooper Union. Speaking to the Daily News, board chairman Marvin Markus describes the always raucous affair as "one of the rites of spring," and quips, "Maybe we'll give out Valium." Ha ha, making a mockery of "rent stabilization" is always good for a laugh.

Yes, it's that time again, when the Rent Guidelines Board will decide by how much they will raise rents for rent-stabilized apartments in the city. The board held its final meeting at Cooper Union yesterday (they are usually noisy), and the Daily News reports it "has adopted preliminary guidelines of hiking rents 2% to 4.5% for one-year renewals and 4% to 7.5% for two-year renewals that start on or after Oct. 1."

Last night, the Rent Guidelines Board met to discuss rent hikes for rent-stabilized apartments. As expected, people protesting the hikes were also present. NY1 reports, "For one-year leases, the board is now looking at a hike of two percent to 4.5 percent. For two-year leases, the range is four percent to 7.5 percent." Last year, the board agreed on hikes of 4.5% for one-year leases and 8.5% for two-year leases. Landlords and building owners say that while those hikes seem big, they barely offset costs for heating oil and water. Still, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn says she would ask the board to freeze rents; one tenant organizer said, "This would be an appropriate year to do that. This is the worst recession we’ve seen since the Great Depression of the 1930s."

Governor David Paterson never ceases to surprise us. It turns out his two-bedroom apartment in Harlem is rent-stabilized, so he and his wife only pay $1,250/month for their home.

Last night, the Rent Guidelines Board recommended to increase rents for rent-stabilized apartments by 3.5-7% for one-year leases and 5.5-9.5% for two-year leases. This figure was deemed too high by tenants and not high enough by landlords.

Spring is when the days are longer, cherry blossoms are in bloom, and the Rent Guidelines Board discusses this year's round of rent hikes for rent-regulated apartments. And this year's talks should be another doozy, as the RGB found landlord operating costs have risen 7.8% over the past year.

Last night was the annual meeting of the Rent Guidelines Board to decide on rent increases for the city's rent stabilized apartments. Amidst the usual chaos (the crowd yelled "Blah, blah blah!", "Free rent!", "Shame on you" and "Liar" while board members spoke), the board approved moderate hikes: 3% for 1-year leases, 5.75% for 2-year leases.

It's the countdown to the final meeting determining increases for rent stabilized apartments coming next week. City Comptroller William Thompson issued a letter asking the Rent Guidelines Board to either raise stabilized rents by the minimum or not to raise them at all, given last week's announced homeowner tax rebates and property tax cuts. Thompson's letter (here's a PDF) notes that the city has not kept up stock for low- and moderate-income housing and that one third of city residents devote at least half their income to rent.

No one likes giving up a rent-stabilized apartment - except landlords. The family of an 84-year-old woman who has a two-bedroom apartment in Windsor Terrace that costs $587.96 a month claims that the landlord tricked her out of her apartment - by going to her nursing home and making her sign a surrender letter. The Post reports that Catherine Burke's stepson is leveling the charge against landlord Philip Meoli. Meoli has a signed letter from Burke dated March 6, and Bob Burke, who had lived in the apartment since 2001, was locked out.

Last night, the Rent Guidelines Board voted 5-4 to propose rent hikes for rent-stabilized apartments on the order of 2-4.5% for one-year leases and 4-7.5% for two-years leases. Loft rent increases would be 2-4% for one-year leases, 4-7% for two-year leases.

It's time for to break out the "Con Ed Sucks" signs! The utility has requested to raise electricity rates 17%; the Post reports, "typical residential cusomer paying $70 a month would pay an extra $12 per month starting April 1, 2008." (The increase for businesses is slightly smaller, 10.7%.) Well, we guess those livery cab drivers have to be paid somehow! And fixing the Long Island City network, which Con Ed should have been doing all along. Here's what Con Ed head Kevin Burke said in the press release:

“Electricity use has increased more than 20 percent over the past 10 years, and we are responding with a two-fold approach. The energy efficiency measures we propose will help slow the rising demand for power. At the same time, we need to increase our investments if we are to maintain a reliable, resilient, and robust infrastructure necessary to meet the needs of a growing population and an increasing demand for electricity."

Not a good week for renters. Then again, when has it been a good one? Yesterday, data showed that the Manhattan vacancy rate is below 1%. Today, we find out that Mitchell-Lama tenants don't get "first dibs" to buy their apartments if their building owners decide opt out of the programs. The Daily News says that the ruling "voids the city's Tenant Empowerment Act," which had been passed in 2005 by the City Council.

Not only is that a struggle that every starving artist is facing, but also those who are just trying to pay the average housing cost in a city where rents are skyrocketing. As many of our friends and colleagues have had to do - get a day job and work on your art at night so you can pay the rent.

The second of five Rent Guidelines Board meetings took place at Cooper Union last night. We walked over to check out the action. The RGB sets the allowable rent increases for the city's one million plus rent-stabilized apartments (that's about half of the rentable apartment inventory in NYC, according to the 2005 Housing and Vacancy Survey.) The increases each year are supposed to be based on the supply of available apartments, the cost of building ownership, and cost of living throughout the city. In reality, the percentage increase each year depends on a fierce political battle between landlord and tenant advocates, who are each represented by members on the board.

Rent stabilized tenants are bracing themselves for tonight's Rent Guidelines Board meeting where the board will most likely vote for a hike. Expect things to get incredibly noisy tonight! Actually, we imagine the basement of Cooper Union might implode from the feelings of self-pity, anger, and entitlement from both sides. The rent increases owners are asking for is 8%, because of higher gas prices and real estate taxes. And not only that, owners may also ask that rates remain only for one year leases - no more two year leases the tenants can lock into. Newsday says that 9,200 apartments left rent stabilization last year, the biggest number ever. The commissioner of Housing Preservation and Development Shaun Donovan added that though rent stabilization is one important part of affordable housing, "it's not as effectively targeted or as affordable as other units that we're doing in the mayor's plan and a lot of units that we're trying to preserve because it's not targeted to the people who need it the most, and the rents aren't set in any way that aligns to the income levels of the people who are living there." Which can be a valid argument, because there are some people who live in rent-stabilized apartments but don't really need them. At the same time, the rental market overall is crazy, and who can blame people for get their best deal?

If you live in a rent-stabilized apartment maybe bend the rules a little (sublet while you stay at your significant others's?), beware: A man found a camera focused on his apartment door. Bryan Lurie lives in a $360 a month studio in the West Village, which basically means his landlord has at least, oh, 600 reasons to find a way to get him out. The Post says Lurie found the spy-cam in the electrical box in the hall, and his friends say he should have the apartment swept for bugs. There's something in the backstory betwen Lurie and his landlord - they'd been in court for two years arguing over his right to the apartment (the judge ruled for Lurie) - which makes it sound like there's serious beef between the two, but Gothamist doubts this is limited to just nasty relationships (and cameras are better than hiring goons to beat up tenants) - building owners like it when their rent-stabilized tenants leave!

The Rent Guidelines Board released its price index of operating costs yesterday, and it reveals that costs for rent-stabilized building costs grew almost 8%. Which makes it likely that the RGB will approve another rent hike, as the RGB had expected a 6.7% increase. The main cause of the increase seems to be rising fuel costs, but critics say the operating costs do not take into account owners' incomes - thus it's not a true picture of a building owner's financial situation.

http://www.nynewsday.com/news/local/nyc-rent1026,0,5821013.story?coll=nyc-homepage-breaking2">too low for the RSA, which says that heating costs and taxes have outpaced that increase. Tenants rights group, the Metropolitan Council on Housing, tells Newsday, "It's outrageous the landlords are suing for even more when they don't deserve what they got in the first place," but the RSA says the lawsuit is really to get the Rent Guidelines Board to "release how it determines the rent hikes." You know, in the court of public opinion, landlords are always going to get a bum rap when their colleagues are engaging in emotional and sometimes physical warfare with tenants. If there's only group of New Yorkers that needs a PR consultant, it would be these knuckleheads.

The Rent Guidelines Board voted on rent-stabilized apartment increases of 2.5% for one year leases and 5.5% for two year leases. Owners had been lobbying for higher increases (4%, 7%) because of increased costs of maintaining buildings, while tenants had been hoping for lower ones. The hearings have been rollicking; the Daily News reported that at last week's meeting, tenants demanded rents to be frozen, leading a board member to say, "Let's freeze real estate taxes."

Today and Thursday are Rent Guidelines Board's hearings for the public to weigh in on the proposed increases to rent stabilized apartments. The board is looking at a 2-4.5% increase for one-year leases, and a 4-7% increase for two-year leases, and you can expect the tenants to argue for lower increases and the landlords to argue for higher ones, with some clever signs and passionate discourse. Today's hearing is in Brooklyn, at the NYC City College of Technology at 285 Jay Street, from 4PM to 10PM; Thursday's hearing is in Manhattan, at Cooper Union's Great Hall at 7 East 7th Street, from 10AM to 6PM. Let Gothamist know if you attend any of these sessions.

Another hearing will be held in June, with the final decision to be made on June 21. Newsday has a look at what the rent hikes were in past years, and there are some really interesting discussion in our post yesterday about the rent hikes.

It's that time of year again: Landlords are tryin to increase the rents for stabilized apartments, of which there are about 1 million in the city. Tonight, the Rent Guidelines Board is set to hear the landlords' arguments, who claim that oil costs necessitate increases of 6.5% for one-year leases and 10.5% for two-year leases; to put that in perspective, last year the hikes were 3.5% and 6.5% for one- and two-year leases respectively. Gothamist looked at the Rent Guideline Board's most recent study of landlord operating costs, and that study says costs have increased 5.8% (driven by a 20% increase in oil costs). We don't like rent increases, but this does make a 6.5% seem reasonable, though a 10.5% a little out of control.

I am the only name on the lease and after 8 years my roommate situation is ending up VERY ugly. What right do I have to ask my roommate to move out? Do I need to give him 30 days to move out? He is making things very difficult and being extremely difficult. He is being very rude and argumentative! What are my legal rights?

Shortly after I moved into my apartment a year ago, I learned that my apartment building is listed on the city housing department's website as rent stabilized. I was never told this by my landlord and was given a regular market-rate lease. It was at a really good rate, though -- $1000 for a fairly spacious one-bedroom in a good location. My landlord also refused to clean or paint the apartment before I moved in, and I spent many hours scrubbing it top to bottom after the previous tenant, who was a complete pig. I decided not to say anything unless he tried to raise my rent.

Help me out please. I looove my apartment. The price is right, the location is stellar, but the landlord company leaves much to be desired. It is now January and they are finally notifying me that my lease is expired, as of October. They are pressuring me to come in and resign the lease from October, at which time they are going to raise the rent and make me pay back rent (back rent = the difference in the new higher rent vs. the rent I have been paying all along).

I've just purchased an apartment and broken a lease, as of October 31 on a rent-stabilized apartment. The lease would have expired on December 31, 2004 and I notified the landlord of my intent to move in mid-September. There hasn't been anything said about paying until the apt is re-rented and I haven't received my security deposit back to date (of course it's only Nov 1), but I'm wondering if I can count on receiving any of my deposit? A friend told me that a lease can be broken if tenant is purchasing property, but I didn't ever find that rule in print anywhere. I inquired with NYC Housing about this, but no answer. Can you help?

-Courtney