Still Lots More Legal Wrangling In Store for Stuy Town

Marianne O'Leary's Flickr

Yesterday one ebullient Stuyvesant Town tenant said he expected his market-rate apartment to revert back to rent-regulated rent levels "immediately," now that the state's highest court has ruled that property owner Tishman Speyer improperly raised rents while also receiving tax breaks from the city. But tenants are almost definitely in store for more legal foot-dragging from Tishman Speyer, which could be liable for some $200 million in damages. After fighting off the tenants' lawsuit for years, Tishman Speyer isn't just going to roll over, especially since the company is at high risk of default on some $4.4 billion in loans. Every million counts!

There may also be dozens of lawsuits brought by tenants of other buildings claiming that their landlords improperly deregulated apartments. All this is good news for the lawyers, and attorney Stephen Meister isn't ashamed to admit it, telling the Times, "Unfortunately for the real estate industry, I’m going to make a lot of money before this gets resolved. It’s going to take a long time." The State Court of Appeals has essentially left it to the State Supreme Court in Manhattan to hammer out the fine print, and landlords are freaking out about what impact this week's ruling will have.

As for Stuy Town, lawyers for tenants will try to seek damages as a class, while Tishman Speyer will probably try to litigate each and every case brought by the tenants. Meister tells the Times, "The overarching issue is retroactivity. The tenants could win anything from hundreds of millions of dollars to zero. They may not get a dime." In a separate article, the Times answers questions about what the Stuy Town ruling means for you. And this has not been a good week for Tishman Speyer: the company has been hit with a foreclosure lawsuit over $154 million in unpaid debt on a LA office park.

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By John Del Signore in News on October 24, 2009 2:21 PM

Comments [rss]

JacqueMehoff

so the tenants will get screwed again while the richie riches get back to being rich.

I say have the Tishman's live there and sell their own property.

NannyState

And the real threat to Stuy Town tennants is the prospect of Tishman filing for bankruptcy protection and skipping out on this judgement. This puts them in the unreal position of hoping Tishman survives..so they can get some money back.

Spirit of 76

Every time I see a picture of Stuyvesant Town, it just looks so sterile. I don't think I'd want to live there, no matter how cheap it were to become. I grew up in a somewhat similar high rise, but at least it was surrounded by other types of buildings like low-rise stores and offices. Without even storefronts on the ground floors, it feels oppressively bland in those pictures.

pinball29

These people wont even get their rents reduced for years, much less a rent overcharge refund. Tishman will fight this until they find the right person to pay off to arrange it in their favor. Or theyll simply declare bankruptcy.

Wait, maybe once the World Trade Center dispute is settled and it gets built, theyll be next in line. Should be any week now.......