Paul Bass Photo
Tenant Lourdes Ortiz displays all the broken buzzers next to the unlocked front door at her apartment building.
Thomas Breen Photos
Luxury apartments at 205 Church; lower-rent 72 Mill River.
Lourdes Ortiz argued that $875 is too much to pay in monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in a rodent-infested, trash-strewn building.
Stephen Slade argued that $3,240 is too much to pay in monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in a luxury building that looks out on the Green and has limited on-site parking.
They went to City Hall seeking redress.
Those two tenants made their cases back to back this week during the regular monthly Fair Rent Commission meeting on the second floor of City Hall.
They pitched the commissioners on why their respective landlords’ proposed rent increases are unreasonably high and deserve to be struck down, or at least mitigated, by the city body charged with protecting local tenants from extreme rent hikes.
The two apartment buildings in question are barely a mile apart. But the two tenant rent complaints reflected just how yawning a gap exists between the apparent living conditions, housing expectations, and rents paid by New Haveners at the high and low ends of a rental market that is currently booming with new market-rate construction.
Thomas Breen photo
Fair Rent Commission Executive Director Otis Johnson with Chair Elizabeth McCrea and Commissioner Howard Boyd at Tuesday’s hearing.
Ortiz said she is a Social Security disability recipient and cancer survivor who lives in a two-bedroom apartment at 72 Mill River St. in the Jocelyn Square neighborhood. That three-story, six-unit, century-old brick apartment building is owned by 72 Mill River LLC, an affiliate of the local mega-landlord Mandy Management.
She appeared before the commission Tuesday to protest her landlord’s proposed $100 increase to her current $775 monthly rent.
Slade said he is a senior lecturer in computer science at Yale University who lives with his wife in a two-bedroom apartment downtown at The Union Apartments at 205 Church St. That’s the 13-story former Union Trust bank building-turned-luxury apartments that are owned by Cooper Church LLC, a holding company owned by New York City-based investor David Kuperburg.
He appeared before the commission Tuesday to protest his landlord’s proposed $50 increase to his current $3,190 monthly rent.
In both cases, the respective landlords’ attorneys argued that the proposed rent increases are not egregious or retaliatory or exploitative. Rather, they argued, the proposed increases stem from action that public bodies like the Fair Rent Commission should encourage throughout the city — landlords interested in raising funds to invest in the health, safety, and good maintenance of their residential rental properties.
The commissioners ultimately voted in favor of the luxury apartment dweller and against the tenant living in the Mandy-owned apartment on Mill River Street. They voted to allow Mandy to increase Ortiz’s rent by the full $100 requested amount to a total of $875. And they voted to allow The Union Apartments management company to increase Slade’s rent by $25, not the full $50 requested amount, to a total of $3,115.
“It’s Not Safe”
Tenant Lourdes Ortiz, next to Mandy-hired lawyer Kevin Lynch: “It’s not safe.”
At the start of Ortiz’s hearing, Johnson told the commissioners that the Mill River Street tenant first filed a fair rent complaint against Mandy Management on Dec. 4, 2019 based on allegedly unsafe and unhealthy conditions in her two-bedroom apartment.
He said that Ortiz and a lawyer representing Mandy Management last appeared before the commission on Jan. 21, which is when the commissioners voted to lower Ortiz’s monthly rent by $200 per month until the landlord addressed the health and safety issues detailed in a recent Livable City Initiative (LCI) housing inspection report.
The Mandy-owned 72 Mill River St. apartment building.
On Feb. 6, Johnson said, the department’s new field representative accompanied a LCI inspector on a follow-up visit to the Mill River Street apartment and found that the landlord had complied with the city’s housing code violation order.
Tuesday night, Ortiz disagreed with the city inspectors’ findings that Mandy had addressed her prior problems with the building and made her apartment a safe place to live.
“It’s still the same way that I said before,” she said. “There’s mouses there. People across the street are throwing trash where I live.” And Mandy does nothing about it, she argued.
McCrea, alongside her fellow Fair Rent commissioners: Focus on the rent.
Hold on a minute, Commission Chair Elizabeth McCrea said. This hearing is about the proposed rent increase, not necessarily about housing code complaints. Furthermore, she said, a city inspector had visited the property earlier this month and signed off on its safety.
She asked Ortiz to focus her testimony on why she believes Mandy Management’s proposed $100 rent increase is unfair.
“Because it’s not safe,” Ortiz replied. “It’s an unhealthy apartment. And $100 is really steep for me. I only get money month to month. I’m on Social Security disability. I’m a cancer survivor.”
“This Is Strictly Market Driven”
Lynch: “This is strictly market driven.”
In his allotted time to respond, Mandy-hired attorney Kevin Lynch argued that Ortiz was long overdue for a rent increase. She first moved into the Mill River Street apartment in 2017, he said, and hasn’t had a rent increase in over two years.
“When issues came up and she complained to this body, we immediately went out there and cleaned up everything and it passed inspection,” he said.
Lynch said the proposed rent increase will only help make the property that much safer and financially viable for the landlord to maintain.
“Really I believe the rent is market-driven here,” he said. “Mandy and 72 Mill River are running a business here. Unfortunately, with the cost of taxes and upkeep, especially on an older building, only getting more expensive, that has to be reflected in the rent.”
He pointed out that Ortiz does not have a signed annual lease for the apartment, but rather rents based on a month-to-month arrangement. She is welcome to look for a new apartment elsewhere if this is too expensive, he said.
“This is strictly market driven. We’re not forcing her out. It’s really just a sign of the times. I don’t think $100 a month is outrageous or unconscionable. I think its reasonable for the times and the market that’s out there right now.”
“They don’t live there,” Ortiz said in response to the landlord’s attorney. “So that don’t know what’s going on. Nothing has been fixed.”
McCrea pointed out again that city staff from LCI and Fair Rent had recently inspected the property and signed off on its compliance with the housing code. She said that Ortiz can file a new fair rent complaint with the commission if she feels like there is a different safety or health concern she has that has not been addressed by the landlord or city staff.
“According to the LCI report,” McCrea said, “everything has been completed.”
She then closed the hearing and told both the tenant and the lawyer that they will know the commissioners’ decision within the next 10 days.
“Comparable New Haven Rents Are Less”
Slade (right), alongside property manager Chelsea Frenette and landlord attorney Robert Chesson: “New Haven rental market has been stable.”
McCrea next called to the front table Slade and two representatives for the landlord of The Union Apartments at 205 Church St., property manager Chelsea Frenette and attorney Robert Chesson of the Milford-based Landlord Law Firm.
Like Ortiz before him, Slade was contesting a proposed rent increase for a two-bedroom apartment he has occupied for years. The conditions and cost of his apartment, as well as the grounds for his fair rent complaint against his landlord, were radically different from the case the commissioners had heard just 15 minutes prior.
Slade said that he and his wife have lived in a fifth-floor, 1,180-square-foot, two-bedroom apartment at 205 Church St. since October 2015. He said his monthly rent for the apartment when he first moved in was $3,050.
And that’s what he would like his rent to go back to now that the landlord is looking to increase it for the third time during his tenancy with a proposed $50 bump that would bring his monthly rent to $3,240 in total.
The Union Apartments at 205 Church.
The reason for the complaint? “Comparable New Haven rents are less and also provide on-site parking,” he said. Otherwise, he said, the Union Apartments are a very comfortable and enjoyable place to live.
Slade said he started looking up comparative rents in November soon before he filed his complaint with the commission on Nov. 25.
He provided the commissioners with three pages of local average rent data he had printed out from the website Rent Jungle.
He argued that his analysis of that data showed that the average price of a two-bedroom apartment was $1,774 in Oct. 2015, when he first moved into The Union. That average two-bedroom apartment rental rate was still $1,774 citywide in Nov. 2019 when he first pulled the Rent Jungle data, he said. And after taking another look at Rent Jungle on Tuesday morning, he said, he found that the average two-bedroom rental rate citywide had dropped to $1,482.
“The New Haven rental market has been stable going back to our original lease in October 2015,” he said.
“Rent trends in New Haven have been more or less flat for the past four years, and now they seem to be going lower. I am proposing that I pay exactly what I paid four years ago. I’m not asking for less.”
In addition to his Rent Jungle research, Slade said he also looked at comparable two-bedroom apartments at other luxury buildings in and around downtown, including Audubon Square, the Novella, the Corsair, and Parkside. All of those buildings offered two-bedroom apartments at lower rental rates than his, he said.
He added that those apartments also provide on-site parking for tenants. He said that he and his wife pay $160 a month to park at a lot several blocks away from The Union, and that they have spent many a quarter over the years on parking meter fees when they need to park closer to the apartment to unload groceries.
“We’re Talking Luxury”
Chesson: This is a luxury building, not an average one.
In response to Slade’s opening testimony, Chesson argued that Slade’s complaints mostly fall outside of the purview of the statutorily defined grounds that commissioners can consider when deciding on whether or not to strike a proposed rent increase. He said those include considerations as to the number of bathrooms, the size of a bedroom, and compliance with health and safety codes.
“We’re talking about a building that had a $18 million renovation done to turn that building into luxury apartments on the Green in New Haven,” he countered. “We’re not talking about $600 units. We’re talking about luxury apartments.”
He said that, based on his research into 16 other comparable apartments in the Union and in other nearby luxury buildings, Slade is paying 6 percent less per square foot than he might elsewhere.
He pointed out that commissioners are allowed to take into consideration a tenant’s income and ability to pay when evaluating a proposed rent increase.
“We’re talking about a renter who makes $163,296 a year, and we’re talking about a $50 rent increase,” Chesson said.
Like the landlord attorney in the Ortiz case, Chesson argued that the proposed rent increase is not designed to punish the tenant, but rather to recoup some of the landlord’s investment in maintaining the property.
He said that the owners got a tax deferral from the city when they first opened the apartments in August 2015. “That tax deferral has come to roost,” he said. He said taxes on the property have gone up over 27 percent in the past three years.
The Union Apartments
A sample J-Block two-bedroom apartment at 205 Church.
As for ongoing maintenance work, Frenette said that the landlord plans to invest between $150,000 to $200,000 this year on re-pointing the side of the 1925-built building.
Chesson said commissioners need to take into consideration the degree to which a proposed rent increase would be reinvested into the maintenance of a property.
“It’s already been invested in the property,” he said. “The landlord is simply now trying to recover some of that investment in small increments in probably one of the best buildings in New Haven.
“I would offer that this commission can encourage continued improvements of buildings like this in New Haven by supporting landlords who are looking to recover some of their investment through incremental rent increases.”
And one last thing, Chesson added. The Union does offer on-site parking. But only nine spaces, at $225 a month. And all are currently occupied by paying tenants.
In his final pitch to the commissioners, Slade said that his relatively high income does not mean that the landlord should be able to squeeze him dry when it comes to the rent.
“I’d hate to think if I won the lottery what my rent would be,” he said. “The fact that I’m able to afford a higher rent doesn’t justify his charging a higher rent.”
“He’s not looking to rent in an average building,” Chesson countered. “He’s looking to rent in a luxury building.”
Back At Mill River Street …
Paul Bass Photo
“You see that trash?” Lourdes Ortiz asked, pointing to the side yard of her Mill River Street apartment building. It was two days after the Fair Rent hearing. She was still eager to be heard.
She said that bags had been dumped and sitting there for weeks, drawing “beavers, raccoons, skunks.” “I was sitting there,” she added, “and a mouse ran through.
She went back in the house, past the doorbell panel where all the apartment ringers were inoperable and the front door to the building was unlocked. (A reporter had earlier walked right in.) She said the bells haven’t worked for years. She said management has promised for over a week to fix the front-door lock. “It isn’t safe,” she said. Inside her apartment, she offered a toor of broken tiles and fixtures, a deteriorating tub (pictured) above …
… and spots where she said she finds rodents and tries to snag them.
In response to a request for comment on the apartment’s current conditions, Mandy Management property manager Yudi Gurevitch told the Independent by email on Thursday night, “Since we’ve been made aware of these issues we’ve addressed them.”
Paul Bass contributed to this article.
I think it is crazy to have a city committee setting rents on expensive apartments. These are not the folks who need government assistance. This is a group of busy bodies second guessing the rental market. The average rent in New Haven as given on some website is not relevant to the market rent on an apartment in a fancy building overlooking the Green.
The kicker being that they allowed the poor persons rent to increase!
Can we please focus on real problems, not rich peoples' rent?