The 7 best ways to get your NYC landlord to make repairs
- Putting your request in writing is the best way to start
- Tipping the super can get the work done faster
- Calling 311 will get violations slapped on the building
If your landlord isn’t responding to your repair requests, here’s how to move the process along.
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Whether it’s a leaking faucet or a broken appliance, it’s inevitable—especially if you rent for a long time in New York City—that you will find yourself asking a landlord to make repairs. Fortunately there are laws and regulations that require building and apartment owners to make repairs when you report something is broken, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will be done immediately
Typically a landlord’s responsiveness depends on several variables, like how efficiently your super or management company runs the building, whether or not you live in a rent-regulated apartment, or how eager your landlord is to keep you as a tenant.
Even so, there are ways you can speed up repairs. Putting the request in writing is a good starting point. If you live in a large rental building, tipping the super can help, as can teaming up with other residents who are dealing with similar problems. If that fails, you can file a complaint, which can trigger a violation.
[Editor's note: A previous version of this post was published in September 2021. We are presenting it with updated information for October 2022. ]
If you're having trouble getting repairs made, here are seven tried-and-true tactics to help move the process along.
1) Put a repair request to your landlord in writing
Rule number one of dealing with landlords is that you should always put your requests and complaints in writing, especially for a big repair job. (Ideally by certified mail, so no one can claim they lost your letter or that your email got caught in the spam folder.) This serves to create a paper trail in the event you end up taking them to court. It also has a way of getting their attention, fast.
If there is a complaint book in the building, log your problem there, says NYC real estate attorney Steven Wagner, a partner at Adam Leitman Bailey, P.C. (a Brick Underground sponsor). However, he points out that writing a letter to the super or to the managing agent and copying in the other makes it official and will get a better response.
Some leases also have provisions for how the landlord prefers to be contacted, so check yours before you reach out, and act accordingly. If you have multiple, documented attempts to get in touch with the landlord to solve a problem, this will work in your favor in any kind of legal dispute down the road.
2) Tip the super to get repairs done faster
It might seem unfair to have to tip someone simply to do their job, but the fact remains that there's no better way to get a super's attention than a little cash, even if it just means being moved to the head of the line above the 20 other tenants clamoring for attention.
A tip can also get your repair done better—inducing, for example, your super to replace your broken fridge with a new one instead of the cast-off in the basement.
Tipping your building staff over the holidays is standard practice in NYC, so don’t be surprised if your super becomes more responsive to your requests during the final months of the year.
3) Call 311 about dangerous safety violations in your building
If you've exhausted your options and are dealing with something arguably dangerous to health, life, and safety (such as vermin, dangerous electrical wires, unreasonable noise, leaks, damaged ceilings, or mold), call 311.
"One of the things that people do to avoid going to housing court is to keep calling 311 to get more and more violations on the building," Wagner says.
Here's what happens when you do: The city will send out an inspector from either Housing Preservation and Development or the Department of Buildings, or even the Department of Health, depending on the type of problem.
“Issuance of a violation against the landlord will confirm the existence of the condition and require the landlord to pay a fine or to show up in court to contest the violation," Wagner says. "In either case, your landlord will have to certify that the violation has been corrected.”
The downside: Your repair may be taken care of, but this will not endear you to your landlord which can be a problem when it’s time to renegotiate that lease in a market rate apartment. (Tenants in rent-stabilized apartments have additional protections and can only have their rent increased by the percentage set by the Rent Guidelines Board and they also have a right to a lease renewal for a one- or two-year term).
A slight variation on this theme: If you're in a rent-stabilized or rent-controlled apartment, you can file a reduction of services complaint with the Division of Housing and Community Renewal, says Sam Himmelstein, a lawyer at Himmelstein, McConnell, Gribben & Joseph (also a Brick Underground sponsor).
You can use this for services like discontinued amenities, but also problems like heat, hot water, or repairs, he says. "If the conditions are really bad—like there's no heat—the rent can be rolled back to $1. But usually, it will be rolled back to whatever it was before the most recent increase and frozen at that amount until the landlord restores all services," he says.
4) You may have to take your landlord and the city to court
If you’re taking this route, it's because your apartment violates the warranty of habitability, the agreement that landlords must provide you with a safe and livable apartment—and you’ve exhausted all of your other options
The city categorizes violations into three groups. Class A is a non-hazardous condition, such as a minor leak or a small area of peeling paint when there are no children under the age of 6. Class B is a hazardous violation, like the absence of a self-closing security door to the building or the presence of roaches or bed bugs; and C is an immediately hazardous condition, including lack of heat, hot water, electricity, or the presence of rodents.
If the city has already issued a violation, you can look up its classification on the relevant agency's website. If not, check out the Housing Maintenance Code to see how your problem will likely be classified.
If your problem falls into one of these categories, you can file an HP Proceeding which will certainly get the landlord’s attention. (“HP” stands for “Housing Part,” where tenants can sue their landlords.)
“The HP Proceeding is a lawsuit that you bring in housing court against your landlord for failing to comply with the law and against the City of New York because it has failed to enforce the law,” Wagner says.
Housing court clerks help prepare the necessary papers to start the HP proceeding. Since you will not need a lawyer, it costs you practically nothing. Taking this route also has the advantage of keeping your name off housing court documents although Landlords cannot refuse to rent to you because they see your name on housing court documents. "This is one of the reasons we advise people to bring HP cases as opposed to withholding rent," Himmelstein says.
“Just be sure to make a complete list of everything that’s wrong,” Wagner says, with regard to HP proceedings. The court will send out an inspector but they will only check the items that are listed, “so don’t be shy,” he says
When the case appears on the court calendar, the attorneys for the city will prosecute the case for you and force the landlord to make the repairs that the inspector confirms are violations.
“These cases usually get resolved with the landlord either adjourning the case to get more time to make repairs before the judge hears the case," Wagner says, "or by the parties signing a stipulation of settlement that requires the landlord to make the repairs either immediately for Class C violations, within 30 days for Class B violations, or within 90 days for Class A violations.”
Fines can be significant if the landlord does not make the necessary repairs. They typically range from $50 per day after 90 days for Class A violations, Wagner says, to $250-$500 per day, imposed immediately, for Class C violations.
“The court will enforce fines not only with a money judgment against the landlord, but if the landlord persistently fails to make the repairs, the court may punish the landlord for contempt,” Wagner says.
5) When to withhold rent to force a landlord to make repairs
While you risk winding up in housing court, withholding rent is sometimes the best—and perhaps fastest—way to really get a landlord's attention.
If you sent the landlord a letter asking for the repair, the city has issued the landlord a violation, and you withhold rent, "you should be in pretty good shape to succeed on a warranty of habitability claim, which is a defense to non-payment of rent where conditions are dangerous to life, health, or safety,” Wagner says. “Some nice, clear photos of the conditions are always a good idea in court too.”
Class C violations stand the best chance of convincing a court that you're entitled to a significant rent abatement. You don't need a lawyer to pull this one off, but you will want extensive documentation of the problem to strengthen your case in court. Take pictures of the problem, and keep a calendar on which you track the conditions on a daily basis, and log evidence of your communications or efforts to communicate with the landlord.
Even with a Class C violation, your case is not a slam dunk.
“The landlord can prevail by showing that you created the condition or by claiming that you did not provide access and prevented the landlord from making the repair,” Wagner says. Usually what happens is the attorney will try to pressure the landlord to make the repairs and get the parties to agree to an access date in a settlement.
Keep in mind that your lease probably has a legal fees clause that will allow the landlord to recover his expenses if he wins. If you win, you get to recover your legal fees.
“You need to be sure that you will win on the warranty of habitability claim or you may be sorry you ever took this route,” Wagner says. In other words, save this option for the most extreme cases.
6) Organize your neighbors to get work done
If the problem you're facing is building-wide as opposed to something wrong in your individual apartment, remember there's strength in numbers. Try to get your neighbors to work as a group to get the issue resolved.
"It's always better to deal with repair issues as a group. I cannot emphasize that enough," Himmelstein says. "You're so much stronger, it's easier to afford legal representation, and it allows you to document things because you have eyes and ears all over the building."
Your best bet is to form a tenants’ association and approach your landlord as a unified group. If the entire building is making a demand and threatening legal action or withholding rent payments, your landlord is much more likely to sit up and pay attention.
7) Do repairs yourself and get reimbursed by your landlord
This option may seem straightforward enough: Get an estimate for repairing the problem, send it to your landlord, and request the repair in writing. If your request is ignored, pay for it yourself, and deduct it from your next rent check.
This is a risky option, Wagner says. "No landlord will ever want you to do it yourself, because they think they can get it done for less," he says. If the landlord rejects your attempt at taking the cost of repairs out of your rent check, you could also wind up in housing court.
There are some exceptions, Himmelstein says. "With ordinary repairs like painting, plastering, or fixing a toilet, you don't have a legal right to do it, but if you do it correctly and you document it—meaning you've written more than one letter demanding the repair get done and the landlord refuses to do it—and you do it yourself, many courts will allow you to deduct that from the rent," he says.
Know your DIY limits and don't try anything blatantly unsafe or illegal.
If you do move forward with this option, copies of the bills and proof of payment are critical to your defense, along with documentation of the condition, notice to the landlord that the condition existed (make copies of any letters and send them certified mail, saving proof of mailing)—and that the landlord failed or refused to correct the condition.
Himmelstein says there are certain repairs you should never do, like anything requiring a permit—electrical work, work that requires you to open up the walls, anything structural or involving the gas line. "These all are no-nos. A tenant should never, ever do that work on their own, as you could have tremendous legal exposure, and likely be evicted," he says.
—Earlier versions of this article contained reporting and writing by Virginia K. Smith and Donna M. Airoldi.
