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LIOC, just check with your own community about the rules. I keep seeing incorrect information being posted on this forum with people asserting things that simply are not correct because they are out of date. You have to decide what's right for you and the people of Long Island have to decide whether they're just going to assume the facts or figure out ways how to address the serious lack of decent, affordable housing. Good luck.
A lot of small men with big egos (and women, too, not leaving any guilty parties out) whose sole purpose is to bank as much as they can milk from the taxpayers before leaving office and LI -- that's who is running the show. It's definitely despotic rule. The quote, "All power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely" should be on Suffolk County's Crest.
The county land that was proposed for affordable housing: ugh! Just because a person doesn't have a ton of cash doesn't mean that they should be situated on land which could very well be contaminated. Of course, any potential problems (sick children, cancer clusters, etc.) won't surface until the elected officials and their appointed cronies and sycophants are long gone. The people of Suffolk will be left holding the bag when the lawsuits roll in.
Your idea appearedwell thought out, good and sound. I am sorry that it wasn't given the respect and consideration it deserved. That area would have been an ideal location for an entertainment venture such as you described and ideally situated close to the LIE.
I recall reading something that a homeowner in the area/school district had written concerning the already over crowded schools and the tax implications. That set me off on a search where I had found a NYS application for a 5 year reduction in property taxes if a person was a first time homebuyer of new construction. The numbers varied by county and stuck with me: a small family with a max income of $73K purchasing a new house at or less than $200K would see a 50% reduction in their first year, deduction decreasing each subsequent year until it was 10% in the last year. In that homeowner's community, this would have wreaked havoc on the already heavily taxed neighbors.
That is what set me on the road to trying to establish affordable housing in areas which already have mothballed or vacant structures within a reasonable proximity to public transport and shopping. (Trying to keep it green, too.) With adaptive reuse, eyesores can become habitable, attractive, multi-family dwellings. The Colt Firearms Factory in Hartford (as well as a number of other buildings there, The Colt being most visible from I-91) is currently undergoing adaptive reuse and it has been a slow, but fascinating process to watch. Once done, it will be wonderful to see the old building still standing, and no longer laying vulnerable to the elements and squatters.
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An excerpt from an interesting article about it (link Northeast Real Estate Business ):
"Fortunately, the developments underway and proposed have been designed with the existing complexes in mind. When completed, a diverse selection of for sale and for rent housing will be available. For example, prospective renters will be able to choose from spacious, loft-style units at Colt Gateway that will cater to a more casual and artistic clientele, or choose the more luxurious units planned at Hartford 21 that will consist of well-appointed apartments in a modern, 36-story high-rise adjacent to the Civic Center Coliseum. As a result of the diverse nature of development, a diverse cross-section of tenants and unit owners ranging from recent college graduates to empty nesters have already expressed interest in living in downtown Hartford.
Downtown rents range from about $700 to $1,200 for one-bedroom units and $900 to $2,000 for two-bedroom units. Rates per square foot range from approximately $1.25 to $2.25 per month."
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Which leads me to my next question: Has anyone, other than self-serving pols and greedy contractors, actually looked into the feasibilty of reusing the Kings Park buildings for condos, co-ops and mixed use like offices and doctors practices? What a great spot for that! There was once a proposal about housing on the property and the buildings being torn down but that was shot down. Leave the buildings, gut the ones that can be saved -- they are newer than the Colt Factory and many other New England buildings currently being reused -- and I would bet the NE buildings have just as many health hazards (i.e. asbestos) as Kings Park has.
But then again, this is something being done successfully somewhere else. It makes too much sense. Your idea made to much sense. The inmates are running the asylum. No wonder they won't touch Kings Park.
That isn't a bad idea of recycling the buildings (im sure people are going in there and recycling now) for a better use.
There are other sites that could be turned around like that or reconstructed to lose some IND look yet work perfectly. Multiple locations that lost business and could be turned around for residential uses..
Yet even yesterday levy the master talk about it man was running his mouth about a farm and look how we preserved this for the future of our children to use...Great you gave that farmer millions to preserve property no one can use for any type of recreation and you could have taken those millions and threw it to a school district to keep possibly 1 family from leaving...Nope preserve for no use to anyone for anything..
You get to use the property by driving along the outskirts and look at it? my kids wouldn't enjoy looking at a piece of property preserved for looking at, neither would I, instead i had to buy property upstate for and to use for fun recreational activities..
I can't understand the minds of the people that are elected running the show, i have met one on one with some of them and had to restrain myself and when i got out of there i wanted someone to kill me for the torture i wasn't smart enough to walk away from, yet i insisted on trying another way to explain it to them.
I truly believe we have 5 people that i know of i would love to have a psychiatrist speak to for me and let me know wth is wrong with them.
I wish I had read this thread a while back.
Our Story:
We(young couple) have recently moved to suffolk county, After looking around we found an place to live -basement type and the land lady seemed nice enough.
1000 all utilities included. The land lady began to show signs of "control", she would wake us up after having worked all night to move our car out of the street, even though there were no parking regulations outside of the usual do_not_block_driveways.
She specifically asked us to park in front of her yard only, which sometimes seemed hard as she did not want us to park too close to her mailbox, or too close to her trashcans on garbage collecting days. She started bein a real pain with do not do this or that, until one day I sent her an e-mail regarding rent because she had been out of the home for a few days and I wanted to pay her on time. She was upset that I would knock on her door with out sending her an e-mail first etc.
Anyway to make long story short, she called a meeting, I had began to suspect that she was 1.not declaring rental income 2. the rental she had provided us was illegal.
I went online to look for some resources from the NYS attorney general page and the town's tenant/landlord regulations , and everything pointed to an illegal dwelling. I was scared, We are a friendly couple and the neighboors already knew us, as we had say hi to them many times, and some had disclosed that they disliked our landlady. We did not want to end up homeless one day because someone reported her to some higher authority.
In the "meeting" with the landlady, we were direct, we asked her, if the apt was illegal,
She had already told me via e-mail that she did not declare the income on the rental and she did not want us to use the address as our address nor her name as our landlady.
When fronted with the question if the apt was illegal, she said yes, she was already nervous and hostile, she insulted us in her own strange way, blaming us for all of her problems(calling us basically bad luck?!) calling us irresponsible for this and that, (for not being gentle when I closed doors, for knocking on her door to pay for the rent on time?!) and she suggested we broke the lease, We said we were quite uncomfortable living under the present conditions("illegal and such" ) and we ended the meeting agreeing to end the lease as soon as it was convenient to us.
I was doing most of the talking, and was very polite, and calm, even when she was irrational in her speech.
I informed her we had to take some business trips furthermore my work prevented me to move prior than March~April and I would let her know on the exact date soon.
I did everything she wanted too ease the coexistence conditions, however recently as my husband was washing dishes the water scalded him and he screamed in pain, I ran for his help and he was fortunately ok, we did realize her water temperature gauge read 160F. This seemed a bit high for a household.
I sent her an e-mail suggesting(in the most polite manner) that the temperature should be checked as it was dangerous and it seemed not to reflect the manual setting of 120F
She responded by telling not to touch her heater and she told me how to properly use common sense while using hot water. I let it go, it was not worth it arguing.
However that evening I worked late and my husband arrived home before me,
she and some angry man were waiting to talk to him, they were both agressive telling him that I was an alarmist by sending that e-mail, and that there was nothing wrong with the gauge. The man she brought was rasing his voice and was increasingly hostile.
I don't understand why she did that? I only informed her that the gauge seemed uncalibrated.
Anyway, My husband was so upset as they would not let him go inside the house, they kept telling him, we are talking to you, you cannot close the door on us etc etc.
It turns out that she admitted there was a once a month spike in the temperature.
The man who came with her seemed angry that she contradicted herself in front of my husband after all this drama.
My husband came to my office shaking, and we wrote her yet another e-mail sumarizing our frustrations and officially asking her to obey our rights, and to try not to harrass us. We also informed her of the vacancy date and that we wanted to schedule a pre-inspection.
She did not reply, It did not surprise me as the e-mail contained in the history her replies from previous e-mails compromising her condition.
This is so stressfull, we are never again renting from any apt that seems dubious in its legal status.
We are both young scholars on a temporary assignment and housing its particularly scarce in the town were we work.
We are literally scared of our landlady, we think that she could make our life even more miserable our remaining months. I just hope that the last e-mail I sent her documenting the facts will deter her from harrassing us.
I honestly do not wish her anyharm, we are not turning her to the irs or authorities, we just want to live and work peacefully, but we do not like being treated like we have and we are quite upset.
Wow.. I have to say that that IS a horrible condition...
I assure you that not all illegal landlords are a nightmare.. honest. My husband had rented an apartment for many years from a very nice lady.. and it was illegal.
My first (and only apartment on my own) was a friend of my parents from their bowling league. It was the upstairs apartment of a cape. They had two yound daughters, the husband was a NYPD officer. Turns out that the day I moved in, he was moving out as they were seperating. He came upstairs to make sure that I knew how to use the fire extinguisher he provided (I guess he was afraid I may have a small kitchen fire.. that I was a bad cook). They were very polite about it. They also allowed me 1 air conditioner on at a time (and I didn't mind.. I understand it can run high and as I was upstairs it would get very hot.) So I had one in my bedroom and one in myliving room. I was respectful and turned it off whenever I left the house and only kept one on at a time when I was home. IN the winter time, because upstairs didn't have a seperate temp gauge, they knew it could get cold before the heat would kick on upstairs and went out and bought me a space heater (which was very helpful, I might add). They even allowed me to use the pool and have a cat (who was a kitten and the daughters fell so much in love with mine that they bought one of their own).
My friend, who has had several apartments as an adult, had some great tennants and some nightmares.. but mostly great.
I guess my advice to anyone who is going to rent an illegal apartment is this. Have hte potential landlord/landlady lay out all the rules right there for you... what they will allow, won't allow. Ask them how they feel about you havign guests (although assure them they wont' be rowdy) and ask them how / when they want the rent, etc (like is knocking on their door okay). Tell them YOUR boundaries as well.. like you would prefer that if they DID want to enter the apartment to please ask you first..etc. And let them know that they can't just come in becasue, that they have to have a reason. If you find that you are in agreement than you should get along just fine. Otherwise, move on and find a different apartment. (Because the the landlady had young daughters , whom were impressionable and looked up to me a bit..I didn't know how to handle any potential overnight guests.. if and when I did have one.. LOL. but the landlady assured me that that was my business and that she would respect that and would think of somethign to tell her daughters.. should it ever come up.. it neer really did.. but I felt I needed to address it.
K.. good luck.. find another apartment ASAP. As for your "lease" she can't hold you to it because it's not a legal apartment and wouldn't stand up in court. (I've watched Judge Judy and People's Court a few times..LOL)
I have a legal accessory apartment in Huntington. You are definitely dealing with a crazy person who is not looking out for best interests. Given the fact that she's already told you that it's illegal and therefore she's given you a lot of control, I'm amazed she's not being nicer to you. Get out quickly. If you want to pay an extra month's rent, find an agency. In Huntington, at least, they are required to make sure the apartments are legal or they face problems with their own licenses. There shouldn't be any more rules beyond what is spelled out in the lease, though,as someone pointed out above, I doubt the lease has any validity. However, she can still make your life hell, so I'd urge you to get out of there as soon as convenient. And good luck getting back your deposit. She'll probably claim you caused a lot of damage and try to hold onto your money. Good luck, Please let us know how things are going.
Yes, I agree we should have been more careful when we accepted to live in her home, Unfortunately, we cannot move until april1 and we really don't trust her.
I think she now may feel threatened because we have flashed our rights,Why else would she had brought that man to talk to us about a temperature sensor, and she is a very strange person, almost wicked. her house had squirrles falling down the chimney and they were getting trapped right by the wall our our bedroom(basement). She never took care of it. Now there are at least 3 dead squirrels in between the walls, She blamed us and told us we brought pest to her house?!! the squirrels?
We must have climbed to her roof and drop squirrel after squirrel down the oil chimney...!! absurd.!!
Last night I had nightmares of her CO poisoning us.(we have no smoke detectors)
To be honest we are both scared of coming home everynight.
If I were you, I would go to an attorney NOW and document everything. Print out ALL emails exchanged between you and her. She is TROUBLE. She will probably do damage to the apartment once you leave and claim you did it.
I'm sure you won't be getting any of your security deposit back, either so, if I were you, I wouldn't give her rent for the last month you'll be living there. Tell her to use your security deposit ---- which is supposed to be in an interest-bearing escrow account ---- as the last month's rent.
I hope you'll think a little more before getting your next apartment. Make sure it's LEGAL and make sure the LL isn't a nut!
She wanted us to pay cash, but we insisted on check or mo, I have records of her cashing them. I also put on the memo of the checks(the for section): "rent for january address" , for example
Some of my colleagues also suggested I moved asap , before the april dealine but with out allowing her to intimidate us. It has been 2 days since I sent her the e-mail asking her to stop harrassing us and to follow the law. We have not since seen her or heard from her, We however, have a late work schedule, 11am -2am roughly, so we don't see much of her.
I wonder if there are any support/help groups for tenants under similar conditions as ours.
I almost want to have a chat with our housing department office at my work(this is were my landlord as well as other people listed vacant premises available for rent), there should be something that informs people like us of the rights and obligations tenant/landlords under NYS law, also to inform of the facts surrounding illegal dwellings.
I understand that housing is a huge issue for long Island, specially the area were we are at. Illegal dwellings seem ubiquitous, however some kind of protections should exist.
We are the "informed" type of people and know how to easily access information, I wonder what it must be like for others under more delicate circumstances. terrible...
Or maybe its just have never been treated this way, ever!, maybe its part of the long Island charm?
Ill keep people posted on what I find out/happens.
p.s. Incidentally, I had a chance to talk to some people that have been proposing some infracstructure changes within the county in different town meetings, and apparently most home owners get quite sensitive about any new type of infrastructure planning! They, for the most part, vehemtly oppose creating new and affordable housing on the grounds that taxes will increase? and that low income people will bring more crime.?
I am sorry but most junior scientists and teachers are considered "low income people" by federal standards, how do they expect to keep younger educated folks around.
I guess they prefer having basements under the radar.
Its really a shame.
Last edited by maryanya; 01-16-2008 at 12:05 PM..
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