Upstate landlords lob another lawsuit at rent control

An upstate landlord group is lacing up its boots in a bid to stomp out rent control in the Hudson Valley.

The Hudson Valley Property Owners Association filed suit against the city of Newburgh this week, alleging it bungled a vacancy survey that allowed the city to opt in to rent stabilization, court records show.

The action brought an immediate dividend Wednesday, as a state judge blocked the city and the state housing agency from enforcing rent stabilization ahead of an April 5 court date, the Times Union reported.

The owners’ complaint mirrors their suit against the city of Kingston in 2022, which alleged that the city used a flawed vacancy survey to enact rent stabilization.

The landlords’ beef with Newburgh’s survey boils down to simple math and nonprofits.

Newburgh calculated a 3.9 percent vacancy rate by dividing its count of 29 vacant, available units by 738 units eligible for rent stabilization. Under state law, a vacancy rate below 5 percent enables a locality to declare a housing emergency and impose rent stabilization.

The owners group notes that Newburgh did not count as vacant 87 apartments that were unavailable or under construction, yet included them in the total number of units, artificially reducing the vacancy rate.

“Newburgh cannot have it both ways,” the complaint reads.

Excluding them from the calculation would have still yielded a vacancy rate of 4.4 percent, which is low enough to declare a housing emergency. But the owners also note Newburgh counted apartments in nonprofit buildings, which typically do not qualify for rent stabilization.

Tenant group For the Many, which aided the push for rent stabilization in both cities, said the landlords were “frivolously challenging” the study “just as they did in Kingston.”

The owners argued in Kingston that the city only polled a fraction of owners, counted buildings as occupied even if the landlord didn’t respond, and skipped others altogether. A court temporarily blocked rent stabilization, but ruled last February that the owners’ claims weren’t enough to toss rent control.

The court’s decision noted state law doesn’t specify how municipalities should measure vacancies.

Kingston’s Rent Control Board approved a rent freeze a few months later, the Times Union reported.

Still, the landlords’ claims against Kingston may have legs. They appealed the February decision, and the case is still making its way through the courts.

Rent stabilization was not allowed upstate until June 2019, when state lawmakers made it possible statewide.

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