High-rent vacancy deregulation after HSTPA: which apartments stay deregulated
Apartments properly deregulated before June 14, 2019 generally stay deregulated. Proving it was proper depends on the rent history and the renovation file.
Two questions for each apartment
When did it leave rent stabilization? An apartment shown as stabilized on a lease or registration after June 14, 2019, and later carried as free market, did not leave through high-rent vacancy. That route no longer existed.
If it left before, did the legal rent actually cross the threshold? The threshold applied to the legal regulated rent, not the rent the owner chose to charge.
| Vacancy date | Deregulation threshold |
|---|---|
| Before June 24, 2011 | $2,000 |
| June 24, 2011 to June 14, 2015 | $2,500 |
| June 15, 2015 to June 14, 2019 | $2,700, adjusted each January 1 by the one-year guideline; $2,774.76 in 2019 |
| On or after June 14, 2019 | No high-rent vacancy deregulation |
Individual apartment improvements
Most pre-2019 deregulations depended on individual apartment improvement increases to push the legal rent over the threshold. Before HSTPA, the permanent increase was 1/40 of the cost in buildings with 35 or fewer apartments and 1/60 in larger buildings (1/40 for all buildings before September 2011). The owner has to prove both the work and the cost: contracts, invoices, cancelled checks or other proof of payment, permits where required, and before-and-after photographs. When an apartment is claimed as deregulated and there is no improvement file at all, that absence is itself the finding.
HSTPA changed individual apartment improvement increases for work after June 14, 2019. The amounts, caps, and duration are different, and the rules were amended again after 2019.
J-51 and other tax benefits
Under the Court of Appeals' 2009 decision in Roberts v. Tishman Speyer, apartments in buildings receiving J-51 benefits could not be deregulated under the luxury decontrol provisions while those benefits were in effect. Check the building's tax-benefit history for the year each apartment was deregulated.
The registration trail
The DHCR registration history should show the apartment's exit and the reason. An apartment registered as permanently exempt that later reappears on a stabilized lease is an inconsistency DHCR and tenants will use.
Have Evan review it
I review each apartment claimed as deregulated against its registration history, leases, renovation file, and tax-benefit history, and tell you in writing which claims hold up.
Flat fee, quoted in writing before any work begins. Written memo delivered on a fixed date.