435 Cent. Park W. Tenant Ass'n v. Park Front Apartments, LLC

• Decision Date: 28 May 2020
• Docket Number: 11474,Index 452296/16
• Parties: 435 CENTRAL PARK WEST TENANT ASSOCIATION, et al., Plaintiffs–Respondents, v. PARK FRONT APARTMENTS, LLC, Defendant–Appellant.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

183 A.D.3d 509

125 N.Y.S.3d 85

435 CENTRAL PARK WEST TENANT ASSOCIATION, et al., Plaintiffs–Respondents,

v.PARK FRONT APARTMENTS, LLC, Defendant–Appellant.

11474

Index 452296/16

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department, New York.

ENTERED: MAY 28, 2020

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP, New York (Kathleen M. Sullivan of counsel), for appellant.

The Legal Aid Society, New York (Jason Wu of counsel), for respondents.

Acosta, P.J., Renwick, Richter, Gonza´lez, JJ.

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Carol R. Edmead, J.), entered November 1, 2019, which, insofar as appealed from as limited by the briefs, denied defendant's motion for summary judgment dismissing the cause of action alleging rent overcharge, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

Plaintiffs are 435 Central Park West Tenant Association, an unincorporated association comprising low and moderate income tenants of the subject building located at 435 Central Park West, New York, NY, and individual tenants of the building. Plaintiffs commenced this action against defendant Park Front Apartments, LLC, the current owner of the building, seeking a declaratory judgment that plaintiffs' tenancies are subject to the Rent Stabilization Law (the RSL) and damages stemming from overcharging. On a prior appeal, this Court declared that the building in question was subject to the RSL as of April 12, 2011, when the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) oversight of the property ceased ( 435 Central Park West Tenant Association et al. v. Park Front Apartments, LLC, 164 A.D.3d 411, 83 N.Y.S.3d 457 [1st Dept. 2018] ). The action then continued on the tenant's cause of action for rent overcharge under the RSL.

On June 14, 2019, while this action was pending, New York State enacted the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019 (L. 2019, ch. 36) (HSTPA). This legislation made comprehensive changes to the rent laws. As relevant here, part F of the HSTPA, which amended RSL of 1969 (Administrative Code of City of N.Y.) § 26–516 and CPLR 213–a, govern claims of rent overcharge and the statute of limitations for bringing such claims. However, the Court of Appeals has determined that the HSTPA, which requires that the entire rent history be examined, cannot be retroactively applied to overcharges alleged to have occurred before the HSTPA's enactment in 2019 (see Regina Metro. Co., LLC v. New York State Div. of Hous. & Community Renewal , ––– N.Y.3d ––––, ––––, ––– N.Y.S.3d ––––, ––– N.E.3d ––––, 2020 N.Y. Slip Op. 02127, *9, 2020 WL 1557900 [2020] ["We conclude that the overcharge calculation amendments (of the HSTPA) cannot be applied retroactively to overcharges that occurred prior to their enactment."] ). Thus, the changes made therein are not applicable here, and the pre-HSTPA law applies, which Regina described as follows:

"The rule that emerges from our precedent is that, under the prior law, review of rental history outside the four-year lookback period was permitted only in the limited category of cases where the tenant produced evidence of a fraudulent scheme to deregulate and, even then, solely to ascertain whether fraud occurred—not to furnish evidence for calculation of the base date rent or permit recovery for years of overcharges barred by the statute of limitations ( Grimm, 15 N.Y.3d at 367, 912 N.Y.S.2d 491, 938 N.E.2d 924 ). In fraud cases, this Court sanctioned use of the default formula to set the base date rent. Otherwise, for overcharge calculation purposes, the base date rent was the rent actually

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