New York Codes, Rules and Regulations › Title 9 - EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT › Subtitle S - Division of Housing and Community Renewal › Chapter VIII - Rent Stabilization Regulations › Subchapter A - Emergency Tenant Protection Regulations › Part 2506 - Enforcement › Section 2506.1 - Determination of legal regulated rents; penalties; fines; assessment of costs; attorney's fees; rent credits; where the proceeding is commenced prior to June 14, 2019

Current through Register Vol. 46, No. 28, July 10, 2024
(a)
(1) Any owner who is found by the division,
					 after a reasonable opportunity to be heard, to have collected any rent or other
					 consideration in excess of the legal regulated rent shall be ordered to pay to
					 the tenant a penalty equal to three times the amount of such excess, except as
					 provided in subdivision (f) of this section. In no event shall such treble
					 damage penalty be assessed against an owner based solely upon the owner's
					 failure to file any timely or proper rent registration statement. If the owner
					 establishes by a preponderance of the evidence that the overcharge was neither
					 willful nor attributable to negligence, the division shall establish the
					 penalty as the amount of the overcharge, plus interest, which interest shall
					 accrue from the date of the first overcharge on or after the base date, at the
					 rate of interest payable on a judgment pursuant to section
					 5004 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules,
					 and the order shall direct such a payment to be made to the tenant.
(2) A complaint pursuant to this section must
					 be filed with the division within four years of the first overcharge alleged,
					 and no determination of an overcharge and no award or calculation of an award
					 of the amount of an overcharge may be based upon an overcharge having occurred
					 more than four years before the complaint is filed; additionally:
(i) no penalty of three times the overcharge
					 may be based upon an overcharge having occurred more than two years before the
					 complaint is filed or upon an overcharge which occurred prior to April 1, 1984;
					 and
(ii) subject to subparagraphs
					 (iii), (iv), (v), (vi), (vii), (viii) and (ix) of this paragraph, the rental
					 history of the housing accommodation prior to the four-year period preceding
					 the filing of a complaint pursuant to this section, and section
					 2502.3 of this Title shall not be
					 examined and examination of a rent registration for any year commencing prior
					 to the base date, as defined in section
					 2500.2(q) of this
					 Title, whether filed before or after such base date shall be
					 precluded;
(iii) except in the case
					 of decontrol pursuant to section
					 2500.9(m) or (n)
					 of this Title, nothing contained in this section shall limit a determination as
					 to whether a housing accommodation is subject to the RSL and this Subchapter,
					 nor shall there be a limit on the continuing eligibility of an owner to collect
					 rent increases pursuant to section
					 2502.4 of this Title, which may
					 have been subject to deferred implementation, pursuant to section
					 2502.4(a)(3)(vi)
					 in order to protect tenants from excessive rent increases;
(iv) in a proceeding pursuant to this section
					 the rental history of the housing accommodation pre-dating the base date may be
					 examined for the limited purpose of determining whether a fraudulent scheme to
					 destabilize the housing accommodation or a conditional rental under section
					 2505.3(c) rendered
					 unreliable the rent on the base date;
(v) an order issued pursuant to section
					 2503.4(a) of this
					 Title remaining in effect within four years of the filing of a complaint
					 pursuant to this section may be used to determine an overcharge or award an
					 overcharge or calculate an award of the amount of an overcharge;
(vi) for the purpose of determining if the
					 owner establishes by a preponderance of the evidence that the overcharge was
					 not willful, an examination of the rental history of the housing accommodation
					 prior to the four-year period preceding the filing of a complaint pursuant to
					 this section shall not be precluded;
(vii) for the purpose of determining any
					 adjustment in the legal regulated rent pursuant to section
					 2502.7(a)(2)(ii)
					 of this Title, or any adjustment pursuant to a guideline promulgated by a
					 county rent guidelines board that requires information regarding the length of
					 occupancy by a present or prior tenant or the rent of such tenants, the review
					 of rental history of the housing accommodation prior to the four-year period
					 preceding the filing of a complaint pursuant to this section shall not be
					 precluded;
(viii) for the purposes
					 of establishing the existence or terms and conditions of a preferential rent
					 under section
					 2501.2(c) of this
					 Title, review of rental history of the housing accommodation prior to the
					 four-year period preceding the filing of a complaint pursuant to this section
					 shall not be precluded;
(ix) for
					 the purpose of establishing the legal regulated rent pursuant to subparagraph
					 (3)(iii) of this subdivision where the apartment was vacant or temporarily
					 exempt on the base date, review of rental history of the housing accommodation
					 prior to the four-year period preceding the filing of a complaint pursuant to
					 this section shall not be precluded.
(3)
(i) The
					 legal regulated rent for purposes of determining an overcharge shall be deemed
					 to be the rent charged on the base date, plus in each case any subsequent
					 lawful increases and adjustments.
(ii) Where the rent charged on such dates
					 cannot be established, the rent shall be determined by the division in
					 accordance with section
					 2502.6 of this Title.
(iii) Where a housing accommodation is vacant
					 or temporarily exempt from regulation pursuant to section
					 2500.9 of this Title on the base
					 date, the legal regulated rent shall be the prior legal regulated rent for the
					 housing accommodation, the appropriate increase under section
					 2502.7 of this Title, and if
					 vacated or temporarily exempt for more than one year, as further increased by
					 successive two year guideline increases that could have otherwise been offered
					 during the period of such vacancy or exemption and such other rental
					 adjustments that would have been allowed under this Subchapter.