Resurrecting the Rent Strike Law

Abstract

In the winter of 1963–1964, the mass uprising of rent striking tenants in New York City provoked the passage of the Rent Strike Law, a private right of action for organized tenants in degrading New York City buildings to remove their landlord from control of the property and appoint a rental receiver in their place. In the ensuing decades, the Rent Strike Law became a critical tool for stabilizing neglected properties and converting them responsibly managed housing. Today, the Rent Strike Law, now commonly referred to as Article 7-A, has fallen into disuse within the context of New York City’s speculative multi-family real estate market. Meanwhile, tenants living in precarious housing elsewhere in New York State lack access to the law. This Article examines the remedial framework available to tenants in New York State—who, excluded from the Rent Strike Law, lack sufficient tools to win repairs and stabilize neglected properties—to illustrate the continued value of this law in New York City and argue for its extension across the State. This Article further demonstrates how the Rent Strike Law was employed historically as a tool to transfer ownership of neglected properties. This Article closes with policy proposals that will enable organized tenants to once again leverage the Rent Strike Law for its historical dual purposes of winning repairs and facilitating the sale of neglected properties to responsible owners or the residents themselves.

Keywords: receivership, rental receivership, Article 7-A, 7-A administrator, landlord-tenant, housing, access to justice, code enforcement