Here's the piece in its entirety: A Long-Term Guest or a Resident? By: JAY ROMANO Q I spend a lot of my time at my girlfriend's rent-stabilized apartment on the Upper East Side, even though I own a co-op on the Upper West Side. Her landlord is claiming that her apartment is my primary residence and that our incomes should be combined to determine whether we exceed the maximum allowed for her to remain rent-stabilized. My contention is that my own apartment is my primary residence -- I do not rent it out -- and the time I spend at my girlfriend's should not determine primary residence. Who is right? A Glenn H. Spiegel, a Manhattan real estate lawyer, said that to determine whether a regulated apartment qualifies for "luxury deregulation," the incomes of all those who "primarily reside" in that unit would typically be included in the household-income calculation. If the total number exceeds $200,000, for each of the two calendar years preceding an owner's deregulation filing with the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal, and the monthly regulated rent is $2,500 or more, the apartment may be removed from rent stabilization. Mr. Spiegel said that the question as to one's "primary residence" usually turns on whether a person maintains an "ongoing, substantial physical nexus" with the stabilized residence. Here, Mr. Spiegel added, the letter writer may have a strong argument that he is only a temporary resident or guest, and that his income is excludable, because he maintains significant ties to his Upper West Side co-op.
Our partner, Glenn H. Spiegel , was quoted in the Real Estate Section of Sunday's New York Times .
