Kingston tenants owed rent refunds face obstacles when trying to collect

Kingston made national headlines in 2022 when its Rent Guidelines Board gave tenants a negative rent adjustment, essentially a refund. A recent state Court of Appeals decision upheld the RGB’s decision, but tenants have had trouble collecting the money they are owed, thanks to a winding claims system for overcharges, a broken website and the prospect of court battles with their landlords. Kingston renters may have given themselves a refund, but it looks like the check is stuck in the mail.

Tenants living in units covered by the Emergency Tenant Protection Act must fill out a RA-89 complaint form to show that they are being overcharged by their landlord. The Division of Housing and Community Renewal also offers an online application that tenants can fill out, but tenants have complained that the online application is often broken. As a result, tenants have resorted to sending certified mail to DHCR’s office in Queens. 

The progressive advocacy organization For The Many, along with Legal Services of the Hudson Valley and the Hudson Valley Justice Center have opened an overcharge clinic to help get Kingston tenants residing in rent stabilized units judgments from DHCR. Jennie Goldstein, an organizer with For the Many, said 116 tenants sought help from the clinic over just four days. 

That only accounts for about one-tenth of the roughly 1,200 tenants who are covered by the rent regulation in Kingston – a figure that has ballooned since nearly 300 units at Stony Run, a rental complex with a tricky past, were added to the Emergency Tenant Protection Act. Those tenants may have to wait a while for their refunds. So far, DHCR has only rendered 13 judgments on overcharges. 

“I personally call DHCR every chance I get ... tenants are too, they’re like ‘DHCR, where are you? What are you doing?’ and DHCR is unresponsive,” Goldstein told City & State.

Tenants may be running out of time to get refunds. Kingston’s local government plans to release a second vacancy study later this month, which some fear could lead to the end of rent stabilization just as it was beginning. 

Those tenants who do manage to get an overcharge claim judgment from the state can expect instant relief on their monthly rent, but getting a refund from their landlord for the excessive rent they’ve already paid is a different story. 

Kingston tenant Sarah Cizmazia filed her overcharge claim in September and received her judgment in July. She said her rent went down from $1,750 to $1,386, and she is owed a refund of $28,000, but aside from the reduced monthly payment, the process is far from smooth. A landlord has a 35-day period to contest the judgment, and Cizmazia said she expects that process to take an additional 10 months. Once it’s all sorted out, she’ll still need to take her landlord to civil court. Cizmazia also has yet to receive a new lease from her landlord showing her lower rent. 

“Basically the process is, you got robbed,” Cizmazia said. “I got robbed, right? My landlord robbed me for almost three years, willingly and willfully robbed me. They knew that the 15% rent reduction was in place, and they said, ‘No. We're not giving that to you without a fight.’” 

She and other tenants are considering a lawsuit against several landlords to claw back rent overcharges, but they seem to be raring for another legal battle. Rich Lanzarone, executive director of the Hudson Valley Property Owners Association, said they still plan to challenge the rent reduction in court, and even if they lose, landlords have no intention of paying tenants lump sums if overcharge judgments are upheld. 

“Ultimately, there's enough of them in some of these properties that the properties will declare bankruptcy,” Lanzarone said. “They'll default on their mortgages the building, the buildings will get bought out of foreclosure, and the bankruptcy and the foreclosure will wipe away those claims, and those tenants will never collect the money.”

Landlords who don’t comply with DHCR’s judgments could be referred to the Tenant Protection Unit, which has negotiated large settlements from negligent owners in the past. Bankruptcy could absolve an owner from a property lien if one refuses to pay a rent overcharge and is taken to court over it. But the tenant could, in theory, still receive the money depending on the fate of the building. It’s also possible to deduct the judgment from monthly rent payments, which in some cases would result in a free lease.

“The Office of Rent Administration, within New York State Homes and Community Renewal, continues to ensure the laws governing rent regulation are properly administered and enforced; that includes proactive audits, investigations, and other enforcement activities to protect millions of tenants and New York’s rent-regulated housing stock,” HCR spokesperson Charni Sochet said in a statement. “ORA administers the rent laws as enacted by the legislature, and the interpretations of those laws by the judicial system."

DHCR and housing advocates agree that a lot of the confusion is based around Kingston and the Mid-Hudson region never having any form of rent stabilization. Until fairly recently, the future of rent stabilization in the city was up in the air, and a lot of the lessons about rent control learned in New York City are still being learned or adapted to fit a different community. Now, everyone just wants to see some payoff from the years of court battles. 

“I'm not particularly holding my breath that I'm going to see this money anytime soon,” Cizmazia said.