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A Buffalo landlord
sought a needed refresher course on real property law after he was nearly
arrested for locking a tenant who owed rent money out of his room.
For the past 40 years,
Mr. Geoffrey Winslow*, 77 years old, has owned several apartment buildings
and a rooming house in Buffalo. By his own account, he is a good landlord
who keeps his buildings up to code and always gives his tenants the
benefit of the doubt. Earlier this year, Mr. Winslow came to HOME on a
fact finding mission.
Jack* has been a tenant
in Mr. Winslow’s rooming house for approximately 15 years, and his rent
was always paid, although rarely on time. This was not exactly
satisfactory to Mr. Winslow, but he allowed it because Jack was his
buddy. Recently, Jack had fallen months behind in his rent and had
stopped making arrangements to make up the arrears. He stopped responding
to Mr. Winslow’s attempts at communication and it seemed as if he was
avoiding his landlord.
Whenever Mr. Winslow
would see Jack, an argument would ensue ending with Jack telling the
landlord that he couldn’t give what he didn’t have. Finally, Mr. Winslow
demanded his keys from Jack, packed up Jack’s things and told him to
leave. Jack left all right, and went directly to the police station and
told the officers that his landlord had evicted him without going through
the court system. The two officers accompanied Jack back to the rooming
house where they told Mr. Winslow that he would be handcuffed and arrested
if he did not give Jack the keys back to the apartment. When Mr. Winslow
tried to explain that Jack was several months in arrears and had no
intention of paying the rent, the officers told him to, “Tell it to the
judge.”
HOME regularly holds
trainings and presentations for the police, enabling them to better
respond to landlord-tenant conflicts and recognize situations that may be
housing discrimination. These officers were educated in the rights of
people they protect and serve and should be applauded for their response
in this situation.
Jack moved back into
the rooming house while Mr. Winslow was placing a call to HOME to find out
his rights as owner. Mr. Winslow thought that tenants who owed money at
rooming houses could just be told to leave and then locked out, as if they
were patrons at a hotel. He spoke with a fair housing specialist who
informed him that rooming house tenants were protected under the same laws
as tenants in an apartment.
Mr. Winslow decided to
visit HOME and receive as much information as he could regarding this
situation. Already an owner of A Guide to Landlords’ Rights, Mr.
Winslow walked in to the office and met with a fair housing specialist who
gave him a copy of article 7 section 711 of real property law which
states:
A tenant shall include
an occupant of one or more rooms in a rooming house…he shall not be
removed from possession except in a special proceeding (housing court
eviction).
Mr. Winslow was very
appreciative of the help he received from HOME. He thanked the specialist
for her work and told her as he was preparing to leave that he thought the
agency was pro-tenant, but realized that it worked equally for both
tenants and landlords.
* All names were changed. |
