The one percent? Perhaps. Check out Helene's informative lecture about the Emergency Tenant Protection Act, published on Habitat Magazine's website on October 3, 2018:
The Emergency Tenant Protection Act was originally enacted in 1974 and amended many times, presumably to protect the nearly one million non-purchasing tenants living in co-ops and condos in New York City and the surrounding areas. It’s intended to protect against "landlord abuse" and ensure affordable housing.
The rent-stabilized tenants protected under this act, unlike typical co-op shareholders and condo unit-owners, have what I like to call “super” rights. They have rights that were included in their original lease – and sometimes additional rights. For example, if there is nothing in the original lease prohibiting dogs, or smoking, or washers and dryers, tenants under this act would be allowed to keep a dog, to smoke, or, in some instances, to have a washer or dryer – even if these things are prohibited in the cooperative or condominium in which they live.
Read Full Article...
The Emergency Tenant Protection Act was originally enacted in 1974 and amended many times, presumably to protect the nearly one million non-purchasing tenants living in co-ops and condos in New York City and the surrounding areas. It’s intended to protect against "landlord abuse" and ensure affordable housing.
The rent-stabilized tenants protected under this act, unlike typical co-op shareholders and condo unit-owners, have what I like to call “super” rights. They have rights that were included in their original lease – and sometimes additional rights. For example, if there is nothing in the original lease prohibiting dogs, or smoking, or washers and dryers, tenants under this act would be allowed to keep a dog, to smoke, or, in some instances, to have a washer or dryer – even if these things are prohibited in the cooperative or condominium in which they live.
Read Full Article...
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Check out this profile of Helene and her favorite building, the Park East, in Habitat Magazine's October 2018 edition: https://www.habitatmag.com/Archive2/359-October-2018/Bridging-the-Great-Divide
The article focuses on the value of community and working together for the common good. Thank you, Bill Morris, and 233!
The article focuses on the value of community and working together for the common good. Thank you, Bill Morris, and 233!
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Civil Court Committee's Express Lunch Program
Rent Regulation Caselaw Update
By Helene W. Hartig
On Thursday, February 16, 2017, the Civil Court Committee sponsored an interactive “lunch and learn” program. This “express” one-hour presentation provided a relaxed educational setting for new and experienced attorneys, opposing counsel, law clerks, Judges, and court personnel to simultaneously “break bread” and to share insights, experience and expertise.
The topic for the hour was the criteria used to determine whether a market rate rental apartment is actually rent stabilized and how practitioners can best assist landlords, tenants and would be investors in assessing whether a rent overcharge has occurred.
Read Full Article...
Rent Regulation Caselaw Update
By Helene W. Hartig
On Thursday, February 16, 2017, the Civil Court Committee sponsored an interactive “lunch and learn” program. This “express” one-hour presentation provided a relaxed educational setting for new and experienced attorneys, opposing counsel, law clerks, Judges, and court personnel to simultaneously “break bread” and to share insights, experience and expertise.
The topic for the hour was the criteria used to determine whether a market rate rental apartment is actually rent stabilized and how practitioners can best assist landlords, tenants and would be investors in assessing whether a rent overcharge has occurred.
Read Full Article...
Rent-Regulated Tenants in Co-ops & Condos
Managing Non-Owner Residents
By Steven Cutler
Owners of co-ops and condos in New York are apt to find that the neighbors down the hall live according to a different set of rules and often pay less then they do for the same apartment.
Thanks to the state law in effect when most cooperatives and condominiums were converted from rental properties, called The Martin Act, a large segment of their population is likely to consist of rent-regulated tenants.
According to Manhattan-based real estate attorney Helene Hartig, “The Martin Act was designed to give the tenant stronger protection.” It was enacted, she said, because, “there was a concern when the conversions started in New York that the tenants would be forced out of their apartments.”
Read Full Article...
Keeping Track of Paperwork
Properly Managing the Board’s Records
By Steven Cutler
It’s good practice to have a second set of all the records of the corporation in a safe place at the building, says Manhattan-based attorney Helene Hartig. “If something happens with the managing agent or if the board is in a hurry, you shouldn't be beholden to your managing agent.”
Storing everything on-site facilitates ready reference and review, says Hartig, “so the board can educate themselves, and when a question comes up either by a shareholder or in the context of a board meeting, or when they need to provide it to a bank for refinancing, they always have it available.”
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Watch Your Mouth
Defamation, Harassment, and the Right Side of the Law
By Steven Cutler
How much information a board chooses to publish about individual residents in the minutes of their meetings, which is a public document, is mostly left to their discretion. Should they choose to publish the names of shareholders who are in arrears, for example, as fiduciaries they are within their rights to do so, says Manhattan attorney Helene W. Hartig.
“The community has the right to know what’s affecting the value of their investment,” Hartig explains. “If their neighbor is a deadbeat, they have the right to know that.” But, she adds, if they go on to say, “‘and by the way, they have stiffed every guy in town' without conducting an investigation as to whether that’s true—that crosses the line.”
Real Full Article...
Getting Good Help
Tips to Building a Better Board
By Steven Cutler
According to real estate attorney Helene W. Hartig, who also serves as president of her co-op board, “Many shareholders are just too tired or stressed at the end of the day to sit at a meeting and discuss flowers in the lobby or issues with the staff. They would rather go to the gym or chill out by watching The Voice.” Plus, time pressure has gotten more intense in recent years, she adds, “with the impact of the recession, which means longer hours at work.”
Read Full Article...
Managing Non-Owner Residents
By Steven Cutler
Owners of co-ops and condos in New York are apt to find that the neighbors down the hall live according to a different set of rules and often pay less then they do for the same apartment.
Thanks to the state law in effect when most cooperatives and condominiums were converted from rental properties, called The Martin Act, a large segment of their population is likely to consist of rent-regulated tenants.
According to Manhattan-based real estate attorney Helene Hartig, “The Martin Act was designed to give the tenant stronger protection.” It was enacted, she said, because, “there was a concern when the conversions started in New York that the tenants would be forced out of their apartments.”
Read Full Article...
Keeping Track of Paperwork
Properly Managing the Board’s Records
By Steven Cutler
It’s good practice to have a second set of all the records of the corporation in a safe place at the building, says Manhattan-based attorney Helene Hartig. “If something happens with the managing agent or if the board is in a hurry, you shouldn't be beholden to your managing agent.”
Storing everything on-site facilitates ready reference and review, says Hartig, “so the board can educate themselves, and when a question comes up either by a shareholder or in the context of a board meeting, or when they need to provide it to a bank for refinancing, they always have it available.”
Read Full Article...
Watch Your Mouth
Defamation, Harassment, and the Right Side of the Law
By Steven Cutler
How much information a board chooses to publish about individual residents in the minutes of their meetings, which is a public document, is mostly left to their discretion. Should they choose to publish the names of shareholders who are in arrears, for example, as fiduciaries they are within their rights to do so, says Manhattan attorney Helene W. Hartig.
“The community has the right to know what’s affecting the value of their investment,” Hartig explains. “If their neighbor is a deadbeat, they have the right to know that.” But, she adds, if they go on to say, “‘and by the way, they have stiffed every guy in town' without conducting an investigation as to whether that’s true—that crosses the line.”
Real Full Article...
Getting Good Help
Tips to Building a Better Board
By Steven Cutler
According to real estate attorney Helene W. Hartig, who also serves as president of her co-op board, “Many shareholders are just too tired or stressed at the end of the day to sit at a meeting and discuss flowers in the lobby or issues with the staff. They would rather go to the gym or chill out by watching The Voice.” Plus, time pressure has gotten more intense in recent years, she adds, “with the impact of the recession, which means longer hours at work.”
Read Full Article...
Dream house turns into war
PageSix.com Staff
Artist and fashion designer Ramdane Touhami’s sumptuous Brooklyn townhouse was just featured in a glossy magazine spread — but it failed to reveal he is being evicted.
Touhami’s lawyer Helene Hartig told us, “My client is not refusing to pay rent. He has a strong belief that the landlord owes him. He significantly enhanced the value of the house. He made a dilapidated house into a beautiful work of art.”
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Tenant Screening
How Much information is Too Much Information?
Proving a prospective tenant is low-risk should be easy with hundreds of internet people-search sites offering to get anything on anybody for a modest sum. But even with information you can have too much of a good thing.
“It’s information overload,” says Manhattan-based real estate attorney Helene Hartig. “The new technology makes it very easy to find out if someone is a credit or quality-of-life risk, but at the same it makes it difficult because you might get conflicting information. And a lot of the services are inaccurate, particularly the free or cheap ones that say ‘give us your credit card and we’ll do a comprehensive search.’ ”
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Practice Makes Perfect
Helene Hartig, from the Law Offices of Helene W. Hartig, Esq believes you should “write, rewrite, put it away overnight, read it again, and edit”; Frangeska recommends you “write as often as you can”, and Asia says “if you persevere you will see that it gets better with time and practice”.
Read full article...
How Much information is Too Much Information?
Proving a prospective tenant is low-risk should be easy with hundreds of internet people-search sites offering to get anything on anybody for a modest sum. But even with information you can have too much of a good thing.
“It’s information overload,” says Manhattan-based real estate attorney Helene Hartig. “The new technology makes it very easy to find out if someone is a credit or quality-of-life risk, but at the same it makes it difficult because you might get conflicting information. And a lot of the services are inaccurate, particularly the free or cheap ones that say ‘give us your credit card and we’ll do a comprehensive search.’ ”
Read full article...
Practice Makes Perfect
Helene Hartig, from the Law Offices of Helene W. Hartig, Esq believes you should “write, rewrite, put it away overnight, read it again, and edit”; Frangeska recommends you “write as often as you can”, and Asia says “if you persevere you will see that it gets better with time and practice”.
Read full article...
