Fashion TikToker Carla Badami just racked up 4 million views for an explainer video — how a rent-stabilized New York City tenant can ask the state government for a rent record and ensure it matches what the landlord is charging.
Badami hit upon a tenet of free markets: Renters need not just a supply of choices but also transparency.
We should know what the legal rent is on all regulated apartments, information the state Legislature conceals.
Badami accidentally stumbled upon a common fraud.
Worried that her landlord hadn’t sent her a renewal lease after a year’s tenancy on the Lower East Side, she started wondering about the process.
So she went to the state regulator’s website to inquire.
A few days later, she got more information than she’d expected. “This is where things get juicy. My landlord had been reporting to the [Department of Homes and Community Renewal] that I was paying $1,295 a month. $1,295? I was paying $1,850.”
Continue reading the entire piece here at the New York Post
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Nicole Gelinas is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and contributing editor at City Journal. Follow her on Twitter here.
Photo by Alexander Spatari/Getty Images
