New Ruling regarding Stuy Town

this is definitely the best news i have heard...I wonder if Tishman will just not take the tax breaks or start de-regulating the apartments.

The expiration of J-51 benefits does not always affect the stabilization status of buildings. If the building was rent stabilized before the tax benefits were applied, then the expiration of those benefits would not affect the building's regulated status. But if the units received stabilization status as a result of its J-51 tax benefits, then whether or not the building loses rent stabilization protection would depend on whether the owner gave proper notices in the lease and each renewal.

http://www.housingnyc.com/html/resources/faq/421a-J51.html

To be assured of permanent stabilized status, the J-51 tenant must have moved in before July 1, 1985, the effective date of the law.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D03EED6163BF93BA35751C1A963948260

Stuyvesant Town was built after WWII. Therefore, rent stabilization does not end with the program.

if the tenant moved in before '85 and now is leaving stuyvesant town from what you're posting the apartment has to stay rent stablized...wow, wow...

stevejhx - I think you've misread. Sty Town was RS before they got the J-51 (their J-51 runs until 2017 I think). This ruling means that during this time of the J-51 they can't deregulate any apartments. It has been common practice by landlords of rent stabilized buildings who get a J-51 reduction to deregulate apartments using the normal deregulation guidelines. These procedures have been supported by the City agencies as well. To clarify - a landlord buys a building in 1995, in 2004 he replaces the roof, the boiler and the elevator and gets a reduction in his property taxes until 2014 - the court is now ruling that he can't deregulate his units from 2004 to 2014. Again the City agencies have allowed this deregulation and EVERY owner in the same situation has done the same thing TS did. This has never even been considered a "shady" area. It's been industry standard without exception or challenge. And considering how everything in the RS world is litigated and discussed that's saying something. Even the people who wrote the laws haven't claimed that they were being interpreted incorrectly.

This court ruling is the end of NYC if not overturned. There is absolutely no way the city can absorb the trillions of lost real estate values this ruling will cause. It will be overturned or new legislation will have to be passed. There is no way around it - overturn the ruling or the city is over.

TS needs to file for leave to appeal. This was a 5-0 decision.

Jazzman...I don't understand why it would mean the end of NYC if not overturned. StuyTown and other large RentStabl. developments just changed to market value in '01..the years before they were paying taxes, etc what makes the end of NYC.

Julia, the landlords would have to reregulate and PAY BACK the amounts they collected in excess of those allowed by rent stabilization. Many of these building were sold with income-stream projections that were grossly overconfident, but any chance of ever achieving those amounts would be set back by years.

PCV/ST wasn't worth the amount it sold for, but that would be heavenly compared to what it would be worth if the court imposed this reregulation and potential liability for prior rents. The litigation going forward is hard to even fathom.

Julia - here's a post from a guy on Curbed who I agree with. (with some editing by me)
1. Tens of thousands of units that were market rate will be forced to be regulated at lower rates. Rents throughout the city will plummet. Landlord's rent collections would plummet. Landlords no involved with the J51 program will have to lower their rents to compete with the newly lowered rents. Realize that the J51 is a VERY popular program. Thousands and thousands of landlords have used this program.
2. Apartment hunters will no longer be encouraged to buy an apartment as the rent vs buy calculations will now always favor renting.
3. Coop and condo owners will lose 75% of the value of their homes (they are already down 30% and with an even smaller number of potential buyers now prices will be crippled). They will lose more value because the rents they could get for a vacant unit will fall and because why would someone buy if they can rent for so much less.
4. Landlords and condo/coop owners will stop paying their property taxes and water/sewer/oil bills (think really cold winters). They will eventually stop paying their mortgage and the banks will take the properties back.
5. The number of banks lending on the multi-family properties is small and they won't be able to sell the buildings (No new banks will lend on any property in NY -plus there won't be enough landlords with any money left to buy any buildings -non-bankrupt landlords will be using their cash to save their own buildings -building values will be crushed, the banks will eat much of the loss, and these few banks will be forced into bankruptcy.
6. The city will take over the properties.
7. Because no one is paying their property taxes, mortgage recording taxes, transfer taxes, capital gains taxes, income taxes (from real estate related income), water and sewer bills etc the city will go bankrupt (I'll add the amount of money donated by real estate professionals to non-profit organizations will dry up) - the people on welfare will lose their source of income and then we're really screwed. Explain to 50% of the population (yes a bit more than 50% of our populous collects some sort of government handout) that they are no longer getting their welfare checks.
You get the picture?

I'm sorry, but there was no part of this week's ruling that mandates re-regulation or penalties for deregulated apartments during the time the law's construction wasn't yet determined by the courts. So it's quite a leap to assume that those events will be mandated.

And at the same time, the decisions by a few companies to vastly overpay for assets will impact those companies, but won't be "the end of the city".

Jazzman's Curbed friend's projections regarding the fallout from this ruling are simply hysterical. It's hysterically funny, in particular, that he equates lowered rents in rent-stabilized units with lowered rents in free-market rentals -- exactly the opposite of the "rent-stabilization increases free-market rents" argument that's so popular on streeteasy and curbed.

Alanhart - the purpose of the lawsuit was to force TS to re-regulate once deregulated units. If this stands market rate rents will be forced back to regulated rents forcing rents throughout the city to be lower. The J51 program is widespread thousands and thousands of units will be re-regulated and rents will be reduced. I hope that re-regulation and penalties are not mandated but what then does the ruling accomplish? If you had a $1,800 two bed become vacant and then charged $3,000 to the next person without doing any "improvements" what's going to happen? The tenant now has a $3,000 rent stabilized lease? If so great for the landlords, market rents are going down, I'm sure they'd be glad to get an 8.5% increase on a two year lease.

Sure the companies who overpaid are going bankrupt regardless - one would expect bankruptcies in economic times like these - one just can't proforma 50% declines in the Dow. But this ruling will force even careful landlords into bankruptcy. This ruling changes the game. So much so that it will eventually be appealed on a "takings" basis I would imagine.

alanhart, I have not read the decision, but I understand that the court held that TS had no grounds to deregulate apartments during the specified time period. i should have written that they COULD have to take such measures. i don't know what reflief the plaintiffs sued for, or if they were granted some sort of injunctive relief for the pendency of the lawsuit and thus never lost possession of their regulated status. obviously during the j-51 abatement time period many of the apartments that were deregulated were done so by MetLife. I have no idea what kind of indemnification clauses there were in the documents signed during the sale. it is fascinating, though, to try to consider the ramifications.

Let's not go crazy - the article in Crains indicates clearly that this only applies to 300 buildings in all NYC (not just Manhattan). Let's assume conservatively that 100 of those buildings are in Manhattan, that is about 3 blocks worth of building (assuming 25 building per block). This is a massive blow to the developers and investors backing them that bough rent regulated apartments in the hopes of de-regulating but the scenarios posted above are not realistic. Thank God!

Sorry, 4 blocks of building - brain calculator is off today...

I stand corrected -- the decision does appear to require repayment (treble damages, too?) to overcharged tenants. And presumably rent rollback and continued regulation on a go-forward basis.

NYT's little piece on it: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/06/nyregion/06stuy.html?_r=1&ref=nyregion

The real culprit, as far as I can tell, is Pataki's NYS Department of Housing and Community Redevelopment (DHCR), which oversees Rent Stabilization (it's a State program, not a City program). It used to be fairly even-handed in interpreting and enforcing the legislative mandates of the program, but became totally landlord-activist under Pataki, such that any tenant seeking simple legal advice had to steer clear of the agency -- false information was disseminated freely.

Landlords were foolish to rely on DHCR's advice, too, apparently. Pataki was quite a piece of work. It's amazing that his name is being tossed around for US Senator.

Wow. The tenants at StyTown must be out dancing in the streets. Truly, truly amazing,

Tishman's StyTown deal is over over over. What will they do with this gigantic white elephant of a property?

They must be whacking themselves up the side of the head for having paid $5 billion for it.

Actually, PCV and ST are how many buildings? Where the hell did I put that mouse pad they gave me when I moved in?

You and alanhart are correct, it's not the end of the world as we know it. It may be the end of some real estate deals going forward, and the straw that does something to TS's back here, but who knows. I can't imagine many large-scale deals would have gotten done at less than fire-sale prices over the next few years anyway, particularly with Albany discussing changing the terms of destabilization. Someone who wants to invest in a large or small project with rent stabilized units should always be aware that things can change on a dime, perhaps usually not like this, but the savvy re investor should buy at a relatively low price (to accomodate risk) with a long-term plan and goal. That has been lost in the bubble recently.

graffiti, I think they're only in the game for about $52 million of their own. The investors, including BlackRock and CALPERS can't be too happy with this (not to mention the banks).

I really hope that our building maintenance guy doesn't suffer from the fallout of this. One of the most dedicated and charming people I've had the luck to encounter. He's teaching us Spanish, a word and phrase here. I've moved beyond donde esta la playa. and dos mas cerveza por favor. He's been with this building for years, and I sincerely hope he's here for years to come. But I'm not sanguine.

I live in PCV, in a market-rate apartment that never should have become one according to this opinion, and I have extremely mixed feelings.

On the one hand, it was rather ironic that the landlords were doing major renovations partly so that they could pass on a percentage of the costs in the form of rent increases (allowed by law) so as to get more and more apartments closer to the $2000 rent destabilization threshold and yet they were also benefitting from a state program to decrease their taxes for doing so.

On the other hand, I don't really think my apartment is worth $2200 (rent stabilized rent + vacancy + percentage of renovations as of 2004). Of course there would have been modest increases since then, and actually now that's probably fairly accurate. But I don't have a rent-stabilized PCV apartment. People complain about the quality of the renovations, but for a rental they weren't bad at all (mine done by MetLife).

Apologize for the excessive posting. Confused, I guess.

This is a disgrace. DHCR tells the landlord (and every other landlord) that "x" is the way the law is to be interpreted and then a court (over-ruling a previous court decision) says the landlord is going to lose a few hundred million in fines and penalties and perhaps a Billion of value in his property. It seems from some posts that the real losers are blue collar retirees in California who invested in the deal. So we're going to take money from the pensions of blue collar workers in CA and give it to NYers who rented a free market apartment at arms length. Now these lucky renters are going to get a cash bonus and a reduced rent at the expense of hard working people. Doesn't make sense. Aboutready, just realize that if you take any payment you're taking the pension of some 80 year old grandpa in CA.
The landlord was following the rules. They were following the advice of the government regulatory division. They followed the rule the same way as every other landlord in the city. This rule has been around for years. It was always ruled in the favor of deregulation. Sure the landlord has pissed off some people, but there are tens of thousand of NYers who live there - you don't think there aren't going to be a noisy few poo-pooing everything they do? They've spent hundreds of thousands on upgrades (if not millions) - of course not everyone likes the landlord or the upgrades - many of the tenants still think it's 1970.
This ruling just disgusts me.

Actually, Jazzman, I thought the deal was horrendous for all involved at the time. CALPERS really only has itself to blame (although that doesn't negate the pain of the people relying on a pension, obviously, but this was but one of many really bad decisions).

Jazzman, TS has taken a hell of alot from 80 year old grandpas in this complex. The harrassment of some rs tenants has been egregious, and even Speyer admitted that perhaps they'd been overzealous in that NYMag article. They've been hounding people who are clearly potential heart attack victims for the last few years. Every time we see an ambulance here we can't help but think that TS is a little bit happier.

TS wanted an 80 acre plot on the river that they could someday remake to their grand specifications. I have no problems with that dream dissipating. My problems are with the fallout that might occur for the people that work here. And you know what, that wouldn't have been an issue but for greed in an overheated market. So get over yourself already.

Power to the people...if this ruling stands (fingers crossed) the average earner...$120k before taxes can live in a one bedroom apartment without spending half their take home pay on rent

I live in a previously rent stablized apartment where the tenant paid $600.00 they renovated and I currently pay $2495..to me that's beyond greedy so I don't feel sorry for the LLs.

"Let's not go crazy - the article in Crains indicates clearly that this only applies to 300 buildings in all NYC (not just Manhattan). Let's assume conservatively that 100 of those buildings are in Manhattan, that is about 3 blocks worth of building (assuming 25 building per block)."

You are assuming that these buildings are average building size. They are not. These from what I've read do not include small apartment buildings, and definitely no townhouses. As I understand it, we're talking all middle to larger buildings.

To lets say average 100 apartments per building (and stuytown has considerably more than that). That would be 10,000 to 30,000 apartments. No small chunk of change.

Lets say the average rent differential is 500 (I'm being conservative), so 6k a year. Lets say a few years and now triple damages. Say 2 years average x 6 so 36k per apartment.

Or figure that they had to spend 40x in capital to get the difference into the rent. Thats 20k per apartment.

That is 200 to 600 million dollars on the low side, and could get to a billion.

Now consider that stuy town itself has something like 30-40 buildings. You think with their losses already they're going to be able to eat this?

Julia - Do you mean it was "beyond greedy" for the previous tenant to only pay $600? Surely you don't expect the landlord to charge less than he could do you? Do you also think grocery stores should charge below market prices for their food? If not why not. Why the double standard? Landlords charge as much as they can. Grocery stores charge as much as they can. Both provide essential goods and services. Every business charges as much as they can. SImple. If you thought $2,495 was too much then you should have rented somewhere else. And if you thought it was too much you should write Quinn, Paterson, Rangel etc and tell them that you're tired of $2,495 in market rate rents because your subsidizing you neighbor's rent stabilized apartment.
The landlord was following the rules. Why do you think it's great that they will lose hundreds of millions of dollars for following the rules?

To those cheering the stupid ruling: PCV will become a project complex. With you stuck in there.

Jazzman...LLs charging $2495 in a non doorman small one bedroom when the previous tenant paid $600 is greedy..why not charge $1500 but they went for it all with total disregard for people and hopefully now things will balance out for the average person (me) who can live and work in Manhattan as we should without having to spend sooo much of their income on rent. Fairness that's all I'm looking for..Let the LLs make a profit but much smaller than before.

inquirer...PCV wasn't a project complex before why would it be one now...lower rents mean people can spend more on other things which will help the economy...

Because someone has to spend money on the upkeep to make it livable. If the LL does not make money, he has no money to spend and does not have to. I personally think it's the ugliest part of Manhattan, already looking like a Chelsea project, so the only thing that keeps it presentable is the motivation of the LL. With the motivation gone... etc.

"so as to get more and more apartments closer to the $2000 rent destabilization threshold"

that only works for the developer once the apartment is vacant

No admin, if the rent exceeds $2000 and the tenants' income exceeds $175K the apartment can also be destabilized. LLs are allowed to add a percentage of costs of capital improvements to rents, both market and rs.

hey, aboutready, as i understood (regardless of the income of the tenants) once the unit becomes vacant if the previous rent was above $2k then the landlord could go mkt rate for the next tenant.

according to what you say if the rent is above $2k but income below $175k it keeps on being stab? what's the logic of letting sby with income of more than $175k (for 2 consecutive years?) the rent stab is it's under $2k? isn't it an even more ridiculous subsidy than if it's above $2k?

Yes, but even if it's not vacant it can be destabilized. Ask Albany if you want to discuss the logic of the rs/destabilization issue. I think they're just trying to phase the system out in an orderly fashion, while giving people some time to plan, and avoiding the issue (mostly) of kicking the elderly out. But, to destabilize an occupied apartment the rent must have reached the threshold along with the income (btw, there's a movement afoot in Albany to increase the rent and income thresholds, but that's been discussed elsewhere).

nyc10022, your figures are very conservative. I cheated and checked on Wiki and the complex has 56 buildings and 11,250 apartments. MetLife, and particularly TS, have destabilized quite a few apartments, and the numbers were highest probably in the 2004-07 range. I don't know when MetLife applied for the j-51 abatement, but I suspect it was when they started the lobby/elevator renovations, at the latest, so that would have been well before 2004.

Julia - what's fair about making a landlord charge only $600/month for an apartment? What's fair about asking a landlord to charge only $1,500/month for an apartment that he can rent in the open market for $2,495? Again why do expect the landlord to charge less than he can get? Should Armani be forced to charge $100 for their suits? Should Whole Foods be forced to sell their groceries at C-Town prices? Is Whole Foods greedy? Is Apple greedy for charging $2K for a laptop? If they aren't greedy then why are landlords greedy?

I agree that prices should come down, but I disagree that our high prices are because our landlords are greedy. Do you think they are any more greedy than other landlords around the country? Do you think they are any more greedy than any other business owner?

Your landlord did't pick your rent. You did. The demand from other renters is what made you pay $2,495. If landlords could charge whatever they wanted then my are rents falling so fast now? Why are landlords paying the broker fee and offering 3 months of free rent on an already reduced price? Landlord offer prices it's the tenant who says yes or no and if no one says yes then the landlord can either lower the price or let it sit vacant.

You pay too much because our market it over-regulated. It's that simple. I agree that prices should come down, that lower prices would be better for the city. That's why I'm so excited that condo prices are crashing. NY ranks 49th in country on growth rates (despite what people say "Everyone" doesn't want to live here). Cities like Houston are booming, yet their housing prices are reasonable. Why? Because they don't have any (that's right, zero) zoning rules and an eviction takes 3 weeks vs our 10 months. The "but we live on an island" argument is nonsense. We could building 100,000 units in Manhattan just at Hudson Yards, the East 40's, the East 120's and Sherman Creek. Add tens of thousands more on Roosevelt Island etc etc. Plus we could always build up. We could add 1M more units without any problem. You pay $2,495 for your apartment not because of some greedy landlord, rather you pay it because of idiot politicians who over-regulate and are more concerned about pandering than they making things better.

"Julia - what's fair about making a landlord charge only $600/month for an apartment? What's fair about asking a landlord to charge only $1,500/month for an apartment that he can rent in the open market for $2,495?"

More importantly, the law says the landlord has to put around $50k in improvements to get to that to that point.

Even if, Julia's logic is ludicrous. Because you've been subsidizng a tenant before, you have to subsidize the next one too? Thats greedy?

"hey man, you sold gum in 1945 for 5 cents. so I want that price, too!"

The logic just makes no sense.

> nyc10022, your figures are very conservative.

I intentionally kept it sane to show how even that was big. But, yeah, this is BIG. What happens if this project goes bankrupt?

If? How about when?

All, ST & PCV were built by MetLife (with govt. cooperation) as affordable housing, without an escape clause, so I have no sympathy for any subsequent owners who expect more than the nice little ROI that was originally projected.

Jazzman, I always find it amusing when people cherrypick Houston and similar shitholes to make a point about zoning and regulation. Why not the cities that are MORE expensive than NY -- currently London and Moscow, recently Tokyo? Do they have rent regulation? Why is heavily-landmarked and downzoned Paris much cheaper than London?

I think that people are forgetting the about the current population living there and the purpose these buildings were built in the 1st place. It's affordable housing in Manhattan for the middle class. I totally agree that a new owner who has invested heavily in these apartments has the right to try to make a profit.

However, Tishman Speyer has been using aggressive tactics, bordering on harrasment to do so. Metlife was guilty of it to, however they have a reputation to keep since real estate is not thier core business. Tishman has sent out eviction notices, non-renewals, and 'notices to cure' indiscriminately to current stabilized tenants. While many cases are with merit, over 50% are dropped according to reports.

I personally rather have a middle class community there with services similar to those provided in the mid-90's rather than a strong-armed landlord giving double digit increases that make even market rate renters shutter.

I realize Tishman won't be giving rent increases any longer because of the economy, which would mean they would focus on evicting existing regulated tenants. It's going to be really interesting to see what happens based on this decision. Could Tishman chose to pay back tax credits from J-51 and be expemt from the associated rules??

a_g, this lawsuit was against MetLife as well. I don't think paying back the tax credits is going to do it here.

I should add a bit about MetLife's history, so people understand why they'd accept a more-or-less fixed and modest ROI for their investment in these buildings -- in a way similar to the unions that invested their pension funds in Mitchell-Lama buildings.

Metropolitan Life was from its founding in 1868 until 2000 a mutual organization, not a for-profit company. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_organization

It had no shareholders, only members. Its purpose was to pool member/insureds' insurance premiums and manage the funds in a responsible way that would [nearly] guarantee ability to pay beneficiaries. IMO, commitments made prior to their conversion to a for-profit corporation -- including their affordable-housing properties -- should be honored by the corporation, and extend to subsequent purchasers.

So Metlife if responsible for the majority of the $200 million of 'overcharged rents', given that tishman purchased the complex in '06. I don't disagree with you just wondering why the papers didn't really mention that - unless I missed it.

Looks like a long complex appeal process is about to occur. In the meanwhile will Tishman be able to deregulate additional apartments as regulated tenants move out or are evicted is the immediate question then.

a_g, they may not be ABLE to appeal. It's like the SCOTUS, they have to file a motion asking for leave to appeal. The Appellate Division decision was unanimous, it can't be automatically appealed.

good to hear...by the way a detailed article about stuy town titled "clash of the utopias". My favorite quote....

http://nymag.com/realestate/features/53797/

“Stuy Town is the quintessential rent-stabilized apartment filled with well-educated old Jews (i'm jewish), and you shouldn’t f*ck with them,” says one affordable-housing advocate. “What the hell were these guys thinking?” (refering to Tishman Speyer)

Alanhart -the "more" expensive cities are more expensive because of A. Over-regulation (rent stabilization is just one part of our problem) and B. Population increases.
Compare NYC to any other US city. We have the worst housing stock in the country and it's the most expensive.

If there's one comparison I would never make, it's to compare NYC to any other US city. Least of all highly decentralized sunbelt "cities" like Houston.

> Why is heavily-landmarked and downzoned Paris much cheaper than London?

Perhaps because France hasn't been an economic power for decades and decades...

Kansas is cheaper than London, too...

alanhart - why not compare to Houston? It's the 5th (I think) largest city in the country and rapidly growing. Even with the huge influx of Katrina refugees (an others) housing prices there have remained affordable. But no need to pick on Houston. Why are we so much worse off than Chicago, Philly, Atlanta, Boston, Phx etc. If not over-regulation then what?

Houston had a free mail-in entry contest in a major national magazine a few years back. The prize was a free trip to Houston. Nobody entered. I kid you not.

NYC is the most expensive city to rent an apartment...San Francisco is the second highest but their rents are 50% less than NYC...please let's not shed tears for greedy, selfish LLs. $2495 for a small one bedroom in a non-doorman bldg. is criminal.

And the prices for the buildings the landlords buy are ALSO much higher than anywhere else.

So, you're expecting landlords to buy at full price, and then subsidize you?

> $2495 for a small one bedroom in a non-doorman bldg. is criminal.

Then $1k psf was also criminal... but that isn't the landlord's fault they had to pay the price.

"> Why is heavily-landmarked and downzoned Paris much cheaper than London?

Perhaps because France hasn't been an economic power for decades and decades...

Kansas is cheaper than London, too... "

My point exactly: the regulation has much less to do with it than the demand, backed by money.

"Why are we so much worse off than Chicago, Philly, Atlanta, Boston, Phx etc. If not over-regulation then what? "

We're not worse off. Chicago and Philly are dying cities without regulation. Atlanta, Phoenix and Houston are so decentralized that they barely count as cities -- they don't get the positives of cities, and they don't get the negatives. I lived in Phoenix for a couple of years, and I can tell you that it's a city that demonstrates the difference between inexpensive and cheap. Atlanta's supposed to be even worse, and Houston's simply not discussed in polite company.

I called up the leasing office at stuytown and asked if I could apply for a rentstab apartment and they said NO...

Julia, that made me laugh almost as much as the Stewart CNBC video. I don't know if you meant to be funny, but you go girl.

i knew what the answer would be but I wanted to hear what the leasing agent would say. She played it pretty straight, said they knew about the ruling but it was business as usual.

try again later, and just think, it may be a renovated apartment. i think you should find a roommate and spring for the two bed in PCV, some of them would be below $2400.

"> Why is heavily-landmarked and downzoned Paris much cheaper than London?
Perhaps because France hasn't been an economic power for decades and decades...

Kansas is cheaper than London, too... "

"My point exactly: the regulation has much less to do with it than the demand, backed by money."

It is the demand + money + most importantly constricted supply.

And rent stabilization is a HUGE part of the latter...

"Atlanta, Phoenix and Houston are so decentralized that they barely count as cities -- they don't get the positives of cities, and they don't get the negatives. I lived in Phoenix for a couple of years, and I can tell you that it's a city that demonstrates the difference between inexpensive and cheap. Atlanta's supposed to be even worse, and Houston's simply not discussed in polite company."

Agreed. I was in San Antonio once and asked where the actual city was, and they said I was in the middle of it. These are glorified suburbs.

nyc...i understand what you're saying but it would take 50+ years to deregulate to the point where market rate apartments would come down..I just want an apartment, that's all. If I lived in Ala. my income would afford me huge place, but in Manhattan I barely make it after taxes, 401k..

"nyc...i understand what you're saying but it would take 50+ years to deregulate to the point where market rate apartments would come down.."

ONLY if folks like you (who complain about landlords taking legal increases) get their way!

And, if you haven't noticed, market rate apartments HAVE come down.

BTW, I have read the decision now. This decision merely overturns the dismissal of the case by the lower court, NY Supreme. The class, which has not yet been certified, includes, as far as I can tell, all market-rate tenants at any time. Skadden is representing TS (small chuckle).

The case goes back before the same judge, who my husband informs me is bat-shit crazy and cares not one whit about being overturned. He is unlikely to be favorable to the tenants.

Still, TS and MetLife are not in that pretty of a position right now. This will be interesting.

Who says Paris is cheaper than London? However wrote this LIES. To get a liki-for-like apartment is about the same in comparible neighborhoods of the two cities. Say a 2bd/2bth with washer/dyer in unit in a middle class area 30 minutes by metro/underground from The City, Canary Wharf, or La Defense is comparible to market rate rents in say the UWS, easily. Its somply a LOT easier and faster to get an aprtment in Paris or London than in New York. Like hours instead of weeks in London.

aboutready...i wonder if the ruling will affect only ST or are other large LLs involved. Also, do you have to live in ST/PCV to get back on rent stabl. or can new tenants (me) get a rent stabl. apartment. My bags are packed!!!

Julia, rent stabilization is a crazy beast. In most instances it comes with the apartment, until the landlord can boost it out of the program. As steve pointed out earlier, some units will not exit the program until a tenant leaves. This would affect a number of landlords, but not as many in Manhattan, I think.

In this case, if the plaintiffs win, the apartments will be rent-stabilized until 2017, regardless of who the tenant is or when they took possession. (This is simplistic, but generally accurate, there are all sorts of things that could happen in the meantime in terms of settlement, or the plaintiffs could lose).

I will say, however, that I'm less inclined than ever to move. Julia, rents are diving here. If you can hold out somehow and/or tolerate a roomamate for a year or so, this is not a bad bet long term.

I hear you...the apartment i'm paying $2495 was rent stabl. and the previous tenant paid $640 that's why I'm wondering..regarding a roommate...i've had two husbands so for now the roommate i'm sharing my place with is a white ball of fur...

Julia, I'm paying only a little bit over $4000K for a renovated 2/2 in PCV. I can't think that you wouldn't be able to get a market rate apt in your price range if you move quickly in stuy town (which I think has less spacious apartmnets but a better location, especially as you get close to 14th).

But, you should know, that this decision could affect ANY market rate tenant, including you, in both good and bad ways. In a good way, if you move in and the court rules that your rs apartment should have remained so, you could be entitled to .....

I don't really want to talk about the bad right now. I'm feeling a bit unhappy generally.

The neurons are simply not firing, As Steve pointed out earlier, SOME apartment won't exit the rs program. I really need a vacation.

i was so looking forward to the possibility of rent stabl coming back but just heard from my doctor, simply test and i found out i have cancer...i can't believe it at my age. What this proves is I and everyone cannot plan too far ahead...

update...

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20090316/FREE/903169969/1058

Tenants whose apartments were about to lose their rent-regulated status hope that a court order issued last week will give them a reprieve from huge rent hikes that would force them to leave their homes.

The order stems from a decision earlier this month by the Appellate Division of New York’s Supreme Court which barred apartments in buildings that receive J-51 tax abatements from being deregulated. The ruling resulted from a case brought by residents of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village in 2007. They alleged that Tishman Speyer and previous landlord Metropolitan Life illegally deregulated apartments and wrongfully raised rents while receiving the tax benefits, which are awarded for making building improvements.

Tishman Speyer, which was following standard industry practice in deregulating rents, last week filed a motion to appeal the case. It also filed a stay to prevent the decision from being carried out. The court granted the stay, which means that Tishman Speyer wouldn’t have to make rent refunds, but didn’t rule on the appeal. If the ruling does stand, one lawyer estimated that Tishman Speyer would have to pay $200 million in rent refunds.

Tenant attorney Jack Lester maintains that, theoretically, the stay is good news for tenants because it implies that Tishman Speyer should be barred from deregulating apartments while the issue is being litigated, although that point wasn’t directly stated. He noted that the original case and the stay refer to market-rate tenants, not to those who are about to lose their rent regulated apartments.

Mr. Lester filed a lawsuit on behalf of two clients demanding that Tishman Speyer grant them lease renewals at rent-stabilized rates because of the initial court ruling. He is seeking class-action status for the suit.

Mr. Lester says that Tishman Speyer’s attorneys have indicated they don’t agree with his reading of the ruling but hopes they can work out an agreement. He adds that an agreement would also need approval by the state because it carries out deregulation orders.

Mr. Lester’s case is slated to be heard by the court next week.

Tishman Speyer attorneys declined comment.

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