No Proof of Rent Fraud and No Overcharge Found

Rent-stabilized tenant complained of rent overcharge in 2018.  The DRA found that tenant didn't establish a colorable claim of any fraudulent scheme to deregulate the apartment and that there was no rent overcharge.

Tenant appealed and lost. The DRA correctly set the base rent date as Nov. 2, 2014, four years before tenant filed his complaint. The base date rent was $2,360 under prior tenants' renewal lease. So there was no need to use the default formula to set the rent in this case. Mere allegations of fraud are insufficient to trigger review of an apartment's pre-base date rental history. Landlord need not produce rent records dating back 15 to 17 years merely because the tenant asserts unexplained rent increases. Before the complaining tenant moved in, landlord had always registered the apartment as rent stabilized. Offering a deregulated vacancy lease while charging a rent well below the deregulation threshold and registering the apartment as rent stabilized "can hardly be evidence of fraud."

Gidansky: DHCR Adm. Rev. Docket No. LR410013RT (10/30/23)[5-pg. document]