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On June 21, 2012, the New York City Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) issued an order—RGBO #44—setting the rent increases you may take for rent-stabilized tenants in New York City on leases beginning anytime on or after Oct. 1, 2012, through Sept. 30, 2013. As a result of the RGB's decisions, this year's allowable renewal increases are the lowest increases in a decade.
The Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR) has released the forms you need to register your rent-stabilized apartments for 2012. You must file an Annual Apartment Registration form [RR-2A (2012)] with the DHCR for every rent-stabilized apartment you own by July 31, 2012. As in past years, the penalty for not filing is stiff: You can't collect a rent increase—or even apply for one—until you file.
The Rent Guidelines Board (RGB), a nine-member panel that sets annual rent increases for rent-stabilized apartments, met on May 1 to vote on preliminary numbers for increasing rent-stabilized rents. The board voted for rent hikes of between 1.75 and 4 percent on new one-year leases and increases of between 3.5 percent and 6.75 percent for two-year renewal leases.
On Jan. 20, the DHCR issued new fuel cost adjustment factors for rent-controlled apartments for the 2012 calendar year. The findings indicate that all types of heating oil (#2, #4, #6), steam, and coal increased in price during the 2011 calendar year, while prices decreased for buildings heated with gas or electricity.
Providing individual storage units to tenants is a popular amenity in the city. Extra storage space can also become an additional revenue stream by charging tenants for the use of the storage units. But renting storage units to tenants can also bring added hassles, such as the cost of building the storage units, maintaining them, and billing and collecting money from tenants. Also, if your building has rent-stabilized tenants and you create and rent the storage units yourself, you must worry about the units becoming a required service that you must continue to provide to tenants.
This year has been the first full year of implementation of the new boiler inspection rules. The new rules were signed into law in April 2010, and were fully implemented in May 2010. They pertain to low-pressure boiler inspections, filing requirements, penalties, and waivers. The 2011 inspection cycle recently ended on Nov. 16. If you waited until the end of the cycle, and you own a building with six or more apartments, you must file an annual inspection report with the Department of Buildings (DOB) by Dec. 31, 2011.
The Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR) has just announced an increase in this year's air-conditioner rent surcharge for owners who pay for electricity. It set the monthly surcharge at $29.13, up from $26.83 last year. This year's increase reflects higher electricity costs as calculated by the Rent Guidelines Board's 2011 Price Index of Operating Costs issued in April 2011.
Heating season is fast approaching, and we want to remind you of the temperatures you are legally required to maintain. Heat and hot water complaints probably will be the most common type of service complaint you will deal with this winter. According to statistics compiled by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD), there were more than 172,000 complaints about lack of heat from tenants last winter. In addition, 883 of the owners who failed to provide heat last winter were repeat offenders.
In the June 2010 issue, we wrote about the Department of Building's (DOB) increased attention to apartment balconies in New York City after the March death of a tenant who fell from a faulty 24th-floor terrace on East 39th Street. At the time of the announcement, DOB had declared the balconies of 16 city apartment buildings to be off-limits and that hundreds more lacked proper inspections (“In the News: DOB Appoints New Enforcement Official, Initiates Sweeping Balcony Inspections,” Insider, June 2010, p. 1).
The city's Department of Sanitation (DOS) has a recycling program for Christmas trees and wreaths. It should make getting rid of trees and wreaths after the holiday much easier for you. The trees and wreaths may simply be put at curbside anytime on any day, on or after Monday, Jan. 3, through Friday, Jan. 14, 2011. DOS will collect the trees and wreaths and recycle them into ground cover and compost.
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