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Are Renters the White Trash of NYC Condos?

Teri Karush Rogers — 2010-02-05T13:00:00 00:00

Filed under: How To

Some new condo buildings in NYC are treating renters like second class citizens.

Curbed details the humiliations, which include barring renters from full use of the common spaces and lackadaisical response to repair requests.

"Neighbors think they're no-good party animals who lack respect because they're not invested in the building. Developers, in the cases of unsold units, see them as living symbols of their own failure to sell product. They're a necessary evil," writes Curbed.
But bully-condos may be shooting themselves in the bank account: If a condo gets a bad rap for renters (just check out StreetEasy, where word spreads quickly), then investors-already struggling to break-even in a saturated rental market--may start falling behind on their common charges.

Morever, according to BrickUnderground, certain renter restrictions fall into legally murky territory: Unit owners may be entitled to transfer their own rights to their tenants, much as they would to a roommate.

"If the unit owner has decided to rent his or her unit, and has complied with the requirements in the by-laws for renting, I don't see on what basis the board would have the right to exclude the owner's tenants from a building amenity that the unit owner partially owns, paid for and has a right to use," says Manhattan real estate lawyer Jeffrey Reich of Wolf Haldenstein Adler Freeman & Herz.

And there are certainly some NYC condo owners who believe in equal rights for renters.

"You can't exclude renters," one Upper East Side board member told BrickUnderground. "You end up having them feel like second class citizens and create tension in the building. Your condo/coop is supposed to be a community and discrimination against your neighbor is just not good policy-or nice, for that matter."

Teri Karush Rogers is the founder and editorial director of BrickUnderground, a website for NYC apartment dwellers.

Crazy Neighbors Demand Dog Surgically Debarked

Teri Karush Rogers — 2010-02-03T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Renting

Like chainsmokers and serial renovators, noisy dogs make bad neighbors. Citronella collars and extra training are the traditional measures of last resort. But is debarking surgery staging a comeback?

This morning's New York Times has a front page story about an Upper East Side family that surgically debarked their daschund-terrier mix for their co-op neighbors.

The dog's vocal cords were apparently clipped "after a neighbor in the family's apartment building on the Upper East Side threatened to complain to the co-op board about the noisy dog," writes The Times.

BrickUnderground suspects there may be more to the story, noting that the mere threat of a complaint to the board is not particularly menacing to most New Yorkers.
In fact, no matter how annoying a dog is, a co-op board can't compel a resident to take a specific action, whether it's hiring a trainer, using an anti-barking collar, or calling the surgeon.

Boards do have the power to force the removal of the dog -- or even the owner -- for causing a nuisance. But that's a fairly extreme measure, and New York courts have become increasingly less supportive of these types of efforts.

As for the surgery itself, The Times article says it results in a "muffled, raspy" bark. It quotes experts and owners who say the dogs heal quickly and don't seem to mind their new sound.

Others say the procedure should be banned because it's not medically necessary and that dogs sometimes need subsequent surgery if scar tissue builds up and interferes with breathing.

Teri Karush Rogers is the founder and editorial director of BrickUnderground, a website for NYC apartment dwellers.

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Brangelina: Close Encounters of the "Ex-" Kind

Teri Karush Rogers — 2010-01-25T15:15:00 00:00

Filed under: News

Brad Pitt's purchase last week of the funky $1.1 million house next door to Brangelina's L.A. compound (pictured) helped fuel reports of an impending split: After all, the hunky actor would not be the first celebrity dad to hang tight for the sake of the kids.

Pitt pals Madonna and Guy Ritchie bought a $9 million adjacent townhouse in London when their relationship hit the skids, while Bruce Willis and Demi Moore snapped up facing estates in Hailey, Idaho for the sake of their three kids.

In New York, Woody Allen and Mia Farrow famously dwelled across Central Park from each other pre-and-post rupture. And Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman settled down on the same Manhattan street after their 2004 split, the better to co-parent their two kids.

Hawke told People magazine that the arrangement is uniquely suited for Manhattan, where the population density limits close encounters of the ex- kind.

"If we lived down the street from each other in Minneapolis, I'd have to watch every car go in and out of the driveway. I'd know how late she stayed out," Hawke told People.

Experts agree that not everyone can handle living next to their ex. Jealous and angry types need not apply - for the kids' sake as well as their own.

"It's hard to go out for the morning paper and see your husband's new girlfriend going out for the paper down the block," says Terry Real, the founder of The Relational Life Institute, which holds workshops for couples and ex-couples around the country.

"You don't want to introduce new people into your kids' lives for about three to 12 months, depending on how long you were married, so you also have to be prepared to sneak your date through the back door, and basically still act like you're having an affair even though you're not," says Real.

But for children, there's plenty of upside to keeping the 'rents close.

"The closer the parents can be, and the closer the children's routine is the way it was before the breakup, the happier the kids will be," says Real.

He cautions against blurring boundaries too much.

"You don't want to say mommy and daddy are splitting up, and then act like one big happy family, with mom or dad just dropping by," says Real. It's fine when dad's come over to help with homework and bedtime stories on a schedule like Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Ideally, the other parent would be in the kitchen making lunches or better yet, out with friends.

Successful divided-we-stand couples often work out the details in mediation, says Jill Cohen, an L.A.-based family mediator. She notes that while many amicable ex's are intrigued by establishing a homestead-next-door, fewer can afford to do so in the marital neighborhood.

At a minimum, she says, "try to be within a 15 minute driving radius so it's easy for children to go back and forth without doing a crazy amount of traveling," says Cohen. Proximity is just as important when kids get older and may want some unscheduled time with parent, she notes.

Teri Karush Rogers is the founder & editorial director of BrickUnderground.com, a website for New York City apartment dwellers.

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Next-Door Nightmare: Brangelina Sex

Teri Karush Rogers — 2010-01-25T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Renting

While a few Brangelina fans responded with glee to the news that the couple indulged in marathon 20 hour sex trysts, the idea was troubling to some Manhattanites.

Twenty hours, after all, is an eternity to an apartment dweller subjected to the mating cries of a neighbor.

Worse, say afflicted residents, sexual sound effects loud enough to travel often translate as more anguished than erotic.

"It sounds as though they may be hurt or screaming out of physical pain," one Manhattan property manager told BrickUnderground.com, a New York City apartment-dweller website.

Whether the commotion is nasty or nice, neighbors troubled by nocturnal emissions shouldn't run straight to management (or call 911, or make prank phone calls to disrupt the rhythm, or even shout "Encore!")."It's like any other noise dispute," says Elena Bayrock Sapora, the director of the Safe Horizon Manhattan Mediation Center, which mediates squabbles between New York City neighbors for free: She recommends swallowing any squeamishness and approaching neighbors in person or in a carefully worded note.

"Don't jump to an accusation of sex as the cause of the disturbance," she suggests. "Just say, 'You know, I hear loud noises and they're really disturbing my sleep.' The trick is to boil your conversation down to the effect it's having on your life."

Some apartment dwellers reach a quiet middle ground by shifting bedroom furniture or investing in ear plugs and white noise machines.

Other solutions are more specific.

"We dealt with a situation where the woman downstairs complained about the man upstairs having sex with many different partners in all areas of the apartment," recalls Sapora. "The result of the mediation was that he agreed he would have sex in the bathtub."

Of course, not everyone can be persuaded to dial it down. And in some cases, complaints can climax in an eviction proceeding.

"Our firm was successful in evicting a rent stabilized couple, based upon the testimony of a number of neighbors, as well as audio tapes confirming both the language and decibel level emanating from their apartment while engaged in sexual activity," Manhattan real estate lawyer Eric Goidel told BrickUnderground. "But clearly the most common noise complaints still revolve around pets, televisions, or other audio equipment."

Teri Karush Rogers is the founder & editorial director of BrickUnderground.com, a website for New York City apartment dwellers.

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