Help on lease negotiation/ expiration

I'm NOT a lawyer; nothing I say should be construed as legal advice. If, however, you have the agreement to pay the higher rent in writing (say a back-and-forth email chain that indicates that both parties know what's going on) then I think practically, you just pay your July rent a couple of days early, and don't worry if she cashes the check.

If you don't have the agreement in writing (or if you do, but she doesn't cash your July check), then I'd start to sweat a little. However, again, practically, she's the one who has to get you out, so you have a little time to find your new place.

GL

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

I disagree. What type of apartment are you in, condo, coop, reg apt? First you have no valid lease, I would actually continue to pay your current rent and see what happens and if you are willing to move just do that until you find a place. It will cause you to go month to month and that way there is no penalty for moving out during a lease year.

Its obvious that this is not really a LL you want to deal with if she can not make up her mind. Given that you have not stated that she told you she would not renew, asked you to vacate or showed the apartment to others, you basically are being given the chance to just live there as you were.

The most she could do after June 30 is attempt to evict you which is a process. My guess is if she does not get her act together, she will either give in to the original agreement or you could agree that you will move out when you find a new place and be given a period to look.

As to whether you had an agreement, the first back and forth could constitute an agreement also. As neither side has signed anything either and the LL was still determining what if any renovations she would do as an incentive to the lease, I would say nothing so far is a valid contract.

This of course is my personal opinion.

A few additional details:

1) the original lease negotiation for the lower amount and all subsequent conversations were recorded as both of us work at banks where our calls need to be recorded for compliance reasons; we have access to each of the conversations where the LL agreed to extend the lease

2) the LL is actually an elderly (bad-tempered) woman who may not have 100% of her marbles

sounds like a Brooklyn slumlord.

I am not sure whether the calls matter or not. It is a negotiation, no different then when you try to buy an apartment as until each side signs it is not binding.

Also still don't get if she owns this one apartment or many apartments, how much of a big deal would it be if you walked and she was left with a vacant apartment to her income?

At this time you just have to make a decision as to what you want to do, since she dragged this on, you probably could get away with an extra month even if you move out as it would take time for her to figure out how to evict you if that is what she wanted.

This does at least show why sometimes it is nice to own rather than rent and be at someone elses mercy

wow what a sloppy LL. Do the month to month then find another place.

The LL owns the entire building. If we were to vacate, the loss of a month or two of rent on this particular apartment would not cause her any real financial stress. Unfortunately, the LL has been pulling similar stunts on other tenants and the building has had relatively high turnover over the last few months.

Our instinct is to find a new apartment for Aug 1.

Mikev: Agreed that if we owned, we would not have these kinds of issues. But we are not yet equipped to buy an apartment where we could live for the next 10 years.

Actually, she wasn't within her rights to request a 7% increase less than 30 days prior to the end of the lease, after verbally agreeing to a 3% increase. I'm not quite sure what you want, but ask any Secretary of State: it's really hard to negotiate with a nutcase, even with a military advantage.
Personally, I think life is too short to deal with unpleasant people. You are within your rights to send her a check in the old amount, and accept or refuse to sign a new lease, and she is within her rights to send you a new lease, which you have 30 days to accept or refuse.

Yeah, I would just pay the regular rent you're paying now. If she complains then look for a new place. You must really love your apt to put up with such nonesense.

Triple P, a phone recording won't help you. In NYC real estate, agreements have to be not just recorded but written.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

Thanks, Ali. That makes sense.

And Dylan, its not so much that we love our apartment as we love our location.

You have had a bunch of red flags here. First, the refusal to give you a lease at 3% despite agreeing to it. Second, refusal to do the renovation. Third, changing to 7%. Fourth, another refusal to give you a lease. No offense, you are being treated like a sucker because you are acting like a sucker.

If you want to stop being walked all over, here's what I suggest. First, look for a place to change to on July 1. If you're not looking for a condo or coop, being this close actually helps in negotiating a good rent. Alternatively, go month-to-month by just sending a check now. When she sends you the lease, play the same bullshit delay tactics she's been playin with you: do not sign the lease. Once she has accepted a check, you are month-to-month and she needs to give you 30 days notice going forward. So if she hasn't notified you by July 1, you are good until September 1. Find yourself a place for, say, August 1. Then just move out on Aug 1 without giving her notice.

FYI, if you are looking at condos, doing a search right about now would be ideal timing for Aug 1.

nada knows

and dont forget that, if and when you leave, the batty landlord will lose 1 -2 months of rent and the cost of sprucing up your place to show for rent to the next tenant--ie it will cost your LL more to lose you than it will cost you to move--explain this to the batty one, and if she wont bite, starting looking around--and play her while you take YOUR time at the old rent:

love the idea of having a lease drawn up by the batty LL and then sitting on it for a loooong while--then mark up the lease with a 3% increase as originally agreed upon, woth a note saying you assume the larger increase was a typo

Why do I feel like I know this woman... Are all LLs in NY psycho?

In Equity Investing the first lesson is not to lose money, the second is to never forget the 1st...Buffett

In Real Estate Investing it's never lose a months rent. In other words don't get greedy you risk too much. Why would this "experienced" LL play around like that? makes no sense. I would pay and go month to month and look elsewhere. Unfortunatly you'll have moving costs/fees but at least you'll have peace of mind.

In order to go month-to-month, the LL needs to cash the check we send for July, correct? If she refuses to cash the check and fails to provide us with a new lease, it seems like we would be in a really difficult spot.

To be clear, we have started to look for a new apartment - but we have missed our window for July 1, and its too soon for Aug 1.

Hard to imagine any NY court managing to evict a holdover tenant in less than a month. Just getting to court will take almost that long, and then you can settle by agreeing to be out in another two months while paying the old rent to the court. Or you can ask for a deferred court date on the ground that the landlord isn't repairing the apartment and is in violation of the lease and you need time to get a lawyer to make a counterclaim for the rent you've overpaid.

Also, wouldn't holding your check be enough to indicate acceptance of the holdover tenancy?

She needs to give you a new lease at least 30 days before it starts. By failing to send you a lease by May 30th, she has opened the door to month-to-month. If she sends a new lease by June 30th, and you refuse the terms, you'll have to move by August 1st. You can probably play games for another month, but why bother?
There is absolutely nothing she can do legally to get more money than your current rent for July. I suspect like most so-called "batty" LL, she's crazy like a fox, ie she is trying to pressure you for more money/less amenities.
She owes you a 30-day notice, you don't. You could just send a check for the July rent, dither about the new lease, and move out on July 31st, she wouldn't have a leg to stand on.

Remember to also think through the situation on your deposit.

Nada - I'm not quite following. Are you suggesting that our deposit is lost money because of my looney tunes LL?

The only person who has this right is maly:
"it's really hard to negotiate with a nutcase, even with a military advantage. "

You are here, thinking logically, seeking advice from some smart people, even getting some good advice, plus some other advice that applies to different situations and makes the preson typing it sound smart (inonada) and some people parroting those people but adding even less value (Wbottom).

New York makes it tough to evict and impossible in a short period of time. Use that to your advantage, doesn't matter any of the other elements of the situation with the crazy landlady and forget about this "negotiation" as maly is pointing out. Also use the fact that if you stay, and you write a check and that check is accepted, you are good for that period of time now as a month to month tenant which adds to YOUR flexibility. As far as the security deposit is concerned (I assume your security deposit equals one month rent.), at the point you decide to move and know 30-90 days in advance, keep in mind the first sentence of this paragraph.

I'm suggesting that your looney tunes LL will likely play looney tunes games with your deposit as well. If you go month-to-month and play delay tactics on signing a lease and walk out at the last minute, this'll increase the likelihood. On the other hand, I'm guessing she'll play games regardless.

My point is that you should be prepared to play hardball. I.e., sue in small claims court for it. Did you receive a statement from her ever stating that the deposit is being held in bank acct X, and/or do you have reason to believe that she didn't separate those funds from her own? Regardless, take pics & a video before you leave.

BTW, I'd just pay the extra 10% for the month while I play delay tactics. The 10% to me would be worth not giving her a sign of what might be coming. If the joy of spite alone does not motivate you, I imagine that if she thinks you're moving out then you will be interrupted constantly during your stay with brokers and tenants. Note that I would never suggest such tactics with an honest LL, just that you play hardball tactics with a LL who has been behaving unethically to screw you.

i would use up the deposit once providing the 30 day notice. take pictures when you depart to show no damage and let the LL know that you did that. it's better they sue you, then you suing them. you'll have the upper hand.

Let's back this up and say that no one wants to go to housing court.

It's time-consuming for the landlady, and probably involves the expense of hiring an atty. NYC is a very pro-tenant state, so the landlady will eventually get her vacant apartment, but she'll have to fight a land war in Asia to get there.

For tenants, it's easier, but by no means a cakewalk. At minimum, to drag out the process, you have to keep showing up, which screws up your work life. Also, a housing court proceeding is going to follow you around for years in terms of getting future rentals/buying co-ops.

I am not a lawyer BIG DISCLOSURE HERE, but I would advise sending in your July rent. You are correct that if it is not cashed, it is not accepted. However, at that point you can just sit down and have a discussion about when you will be out without running straight to the court system, I think.

It also doesn't sound like she wants you out, but rather that she is just dithering over the renovations. If that's annoying you, you can get a new place for Aug. 1.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

We will absolutely send in July 1 rent for the new amount (10% increase) while we continue to explore our options. If she doesn't cash the July 1 check, I will move the money into an escrow account and notify her of this by certified mail.

I agree that the last thing this penny-pinching LL wants is to end up in court (and this is clearly not my preference either!), but if she is unwilling to provide us a lease even at the (higher) price she named and decides to escalate things instead of letting us move out by Aug 1, we will be as prepared as possible.

At this point, we have no interest in dealing with an irrational LL who is unwilling to make the necessary improvements to our apartment. The somewhat embarrassing truth is that we have actually sunk a decent amount of money into the apartment ourselves (I know, I know – we will never make this mistake again on a rental). The more time that passes, the more we just will want to cut our losses and find a more reasonable LL.

"The more time that passes, the more we just will want to cut our losses and find a more reasonable LL."

A little lesson I've learned about life. Unethical people tend to think everyone acts unethically, so they justify their behavior by the fact that they think everyone else is doing it, and it is the only way they have a fighting chance in an unethical world. Ethical people learn to sniff out unethical people early on and just steer clear of them: why deal with unethical people if the world has plenty of ethical people, and you have no interest in being unethical yourself?

I would not pay a new amount, pay the old amount. At this time you have no signed document stating what the rent is and there is no reason to give her additional money to play with. It is important to keep sending something as you are attempting to become month to month, however and I am not positive on this, in order to that you need to keep paying the same as what is in the current lease.

There is absolutely no reason to pay the increase. You don't even have a lease. Just pay the old amount and move by August 1st. Make sure to take pictures, and if there is a super on-site, do a walk-through, because the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior: your landlord is a crook, chances are she doesn't give back the deposits unless she's made to.

Oh, please post the story under the address once you move out, to warn future victims. I believe the main reason so many landlords are con-artists here is that it is such a large city, bad reputations don't really reach enough people to make a dent in business.

Nothing is binding until you have a signed lease. Your earlier conversations were simply negotiations, as in any business, and your LL position / leverage increased as the lease expiration approached. Though the courts are tenant friendly, LLs are confident when pursuing tenants of good credit. LLs know they will win eventually and collect what's due or a collection agency will.

Since you work at a bank and probably have good credit, you also want to avoid the tarnish of being through the legal system as you will continue to rent in NY. Knowledgeable LLs use a service that pulls all the court cases against tenants on a daily basis. The service does not provide details of the winning party but gives a red flag on "problem tenants". Even with great credit, a future LL may require more security or choose another equally qualified tenant.

With the current low vacancy rate and July smack in the middle of peak rental season, I'd recommend you try to stay. Call your landlord and be very cordial as all the bargaining chips are in that corner. I can't imagine your asked renovations being too costly - you moved in last year with the apt in similar condition. Find a cheap contractor and take care of the renovations yourselves. Then ask for a lower increase than 10%.

>I would not pay a new amount, pay the old amount.
>There is absolutely no reason to pay the increase.

Agree fully.

mho - I suspect you haven't read through all of my comments. We have exactly ZERO intention of not paying rent. We are not trying to shirk our responsibilities as tenants in any way. And we are certainly not trying to start a fight.

The renovations are not costly, but need to get done. There is a plumbing problem in the bathroom that needs to be addressed as water is clearly leaking through the wall and ceiling. In order to fix it completely, they will need to pull tiles. Since the tiles are c.1970, the super explained they can't be matched and the bathroom will need to be retiled.

This is a prewar building that has not been renovated.

Oh, sorry about that. It's really in the LL's best interest to fix the plumbing problem! Over time, there will be greater damage to not only your apt but the one below. You should remind the LL of that.

mho - i have a plumbing problem in my place and i informed my LL. he said... the D/W is working, why replace it? everytime we do a cycle, we get some water on the floor. i looked at the cabinet sides and they are almost completely rotten because he wants to save a penny... short sighted.

it all depends on the LL.

I couldn't disagree more with mho59. I do agree that it's always better not to get into a lawsuit if you don't have to. But calling the crazy landlord up and trying to negotiate from what you assume is a position of weakness because she has all the "chips?" Then sink additional money into a rented apartment owned by a crazy person?

No -- I see where mho59 is coming from, but in my opinion that's the last thing you should do. The landlord has exactly one chip -- you'd like to not move exactly right now (but could move next month). That's no "chip" at all -- pay for July, secure a new rental, move August 1, demand your deposit, and only THEN go to court if you absolutely have to. (And you probably won't actually have to.)