Hudson St. Equities v Circhi

[*1] Hudson St. Equities v Circhi 2005 NY Slip Op 51764(U) [9 Misc 3d 138(A)] Decided on October 31, 2005 Appellate Term, First Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the printed Official Reports.

Decided on October 31, 2005
APPELLATE TERM OF THE SUPREME COURT, FIRST DEPARTMENT
PRESENT: DECEMBER 2004 TERM SUAREZ, P.J., GANGEL-JACOB, SCHOENFELD, JJ.
570577/04

Hudson Street Equities, Petitioner-Landlord-Appellant,

against

Chiheb Circhi, Respondent-Tenant-Respondent.

Landlord appeals from a final judgment of the Civil Court, New York County, entered December 24, 2002 after a nonjury trial (Timmie E. Elsner, J.) in favor of tenant dismissing the petition in a holdover summary proceeding.

PER CURIAM:

Final judgment entered December 24, 2002 (Timmie E. Elsner, J.) affirmed, with $25 costs.

We agree that landlord failed to establish a pattern of unjustified rent defaults on the tenant's part sufficient to constitute a violation of a substantial obligation of the tenancy (see Rent Stabilization Code [9 NYCRR] § 2524.3[a]). While the record shows that tenant's rent defaults led to the commencement of five nonpayment proceedings over a four and a half year period, at least two of those proceedings were settled by so-ordered stipulations requiring landlord to make repairs or cure violations, and a third proceeding was dismissed for the landlord's nonappearance and was never restored. Where, as here, bona fide claims are shown to exist that an apartment is in need of repairs, precipitating the withholding of rent, a holdover petition based upon chronic nonpayment will not lie (see Bennett v Mantis, NYLJ, Sept. 13, 2000, at 22, col 1 [App Term, 1st Dept]). We have considered and rejected the landlord's remaining argument.

This constitutes the decision and order of the court.
Decision Date: October 31, 2005