PETROLAWICZ v. ANDO REALTY LLC (2026)

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Lori S. Sattler, J.), entered on or about October 7, 2025, which denied plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment on their cause of action for a declaratory judgment regarding the rent-regulatory status of their apartment and granted defendant's cross-motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint and on its counterclaim for attorneys' fees, unanimously modified, on the law, to deny defendant's motion, and otherwise affirmed, without costs.

A tenant may challenge the purportedly deregulated status of their apartment at any time during their tenancy, and the apartment's rent history may be examined beyond four years to determine whether it remains rent-stabilized (see Thurman v. Sullivan Props.  L.P., 226 AD3d 453, 454 [1st Dept 2024];  see also Liggett v. Lew Realty LLC, 42 NY3d 415, 422 [2024] ).

Here, according to defendant, the last rent-controlled rent was approximately $620 per month, but defendant asserted a first rent following decontrol of $2,100 per month beginning in 2011, $100 above the deregulation threshold in effect at the time (see former Rent Stabilization Law of 1969 [Administrative Code of City of NY] § 26–504.2[a], amended by L 2011, ch 97, repealed by L 2019, ch 36).  However, the affidavit of a member of defendant's managing agent that defendant submitted in support of its cross-motion for summary judgment failed to authenticate as admissible business records the documents offered as proof of the foregoing facts.  Accordingly, defendant failed to make a prima facie showing of entitlement to judgment as a matter of law, and its cross-motion for summary judgment should have been denied regardless of the sufficiency of the opposing papers (see Winegrad v. New York Univ. Med. Center, 64 N.Y.2d 851, 853 [1985] ).