Case Notes
Case Notes provides insight on one particularly relevant co-op or condo case—clearly explaining what happened, why it’s important, and what lessons can be learned within.
Category
- Access
- Alterations
- Appeals
- Arbitration
- Assessment
- Attorney Fees
- Attorney-Client
- Authority to Sue
- Balcony/Terrace Rights
- Bike Lane
- Board of Directors
- Board of Managers
- Books and Records
- Breach of Lease
- Business Judgment Rule
- Bylaws
- Bylaws/House Rules
- Certificate of Occupancy
- Charges/Fees
- Commercial Unit
- Common Element
- Common Elements
- Companion Animal
- Constitutionality
- Construction Defects
- Contempt
- Contracts
- Conversion
- Damages
- Defamation
- Discovery
- Discrimination
- Due Diligence
- Easement
- Elections
- Estate
- Eviction
- Eviction/Termination
- Federal Courts Supplemental Jurisdiction
- Fiduciary Duty
- Fines
- Foreclosure
- Fraud
- Governance
- Ground Lease
- Gym
- Hoarding
- House Rules
- Housing Development Fund Corporation
- Indemnification
- Indemnification/Subrogation
- Injunction
- Inspection of Records
- Insurance
- Labor Law
- Liability of Directors
- Licenses
- Liens
- Maintenance
- Malpractice
- Management
- Mechanic's Lien
- Mediation
- Misrepresentations
- Motion Practice
- Motion Practive
- Negligence
- Notice of Pendency
- Nuisance
- Occupancy Agreement
- Ownership
- Parking
- Partnership
- Personal Injury
- Pets
- Property Damage
- Proprietary Lease
- Reasonableness
- Receivership
- Release
- Repairs
- Representations
- RPAPL 881
- Sales
- Service of Process
- Sponsor
- Statute of Limitations
- Stock/Shares
- Stocks/Shares
- Sublets
- Succession Rights
- Tax
- Third-Party Liability
- Transfers
- Trespassing
- Trial Practice
- Veil Piercing
- Violations
- Warranty of Habitability
- Yellowstone Injunction
- Zoning
First published: Jun 2026
The Price of a Questionable RejectionTakeaway Cooperative corporations no longer have, if they ever did, free rein to deny the purchase of a unit by otherwise qualified buyers who are members of a protected class. They must act responsibly to consider lawful bases for rejecting any applicant. That often includes timely interviews and consideration of relevant non-discriminatory factors concerning the applicant. It’s often in their best interest to have their counsel involved as well. In this case, there was no evidence of due consideration of the applicant’s qualifications except that she was a black and/or female. It’s possible that the fact that she was a nurse practitioner, not a physician, may have been a legitimate reason to deny her application. That reason vanished, however, when the board approved a sale to one it is board members with no medical qualifications. Boards are still not required to give any reason for rejection, and they typically will not do so. That may still change with the enactment of laws to require reasons be given.
Read full articleFirst published: May 2026
Is Your Building’s Insurance Really Protecting Owners?TAKEAWAY This case is an important reminder that boards should not assume their governing documents or insurance policies automatically protect owners from lawsuits brought by the building’s insurer. If a board wants to limit subrogation claims against unit owners or shareholders, the waiver language in both the governing documents and the insurance policies must be clear, direct, and consistent. Vague phrases such as “if obtainable” or “may waive” may not provide the protection boards and residents think they do. Boards should periodically review their bylaws, proprietary leases, alteration agreements, and insurance policies with experienced legal and insurance professionals to confirm that coverage and waiver provisions reflect the building’s intentions. For a unit owner to suddenly learn that they can be sued by the building’s insurance company when there is damage can be a rather startling, and expensive, surprise.
Read full articleFirst published: May 2026
The Portal Workaround Didn’t WorkTAKEAWAY This case is a useful reminder that shareholders' rights to inspect books and records are broad, and courts have consistently enforced them. The bar for a "valid purpose" is not high — organizing a special shareholder meeting and communicating with fellow shareholders about corporate matters clears it. Boards that refuse these requests, or try to work around them by offering to relay information on a shareholder's behalf, are unlikely to prevail in court. The one win for the co-op here was the denial of the engineering and construction records, because Levy couldn't connect those documents to his stated purpose of calling a special meeting. That illustrates an important principle: a shareholder's request must be tied to a purpose reasonably related to their interest as a shareholder, and courts will trim requests that overreach. Before fighting a books-and-records demand, boards should carefully assess whether the request is well-founded. Unless a request overreaches, fails to supply a valid purpose, or raises some comparable deficiency, courts have routinely granted them — making litigation an expensive and uncertain path for the board.
Read full articleFirst published: Apr 2026
Paper Bags and Paper WarsTAKEAWAY For condo boards, this case is a reminder that the most mundane-seeming disputes — in this instance, a grocery store blocking a sidewalk during deliveries — can metastasize into years of costly litigation. The fight at 100 West 93rd Street has been going on since January 2022, and as of March 2026, the case has yet to be heard on its merits. It is still mired in pretrial skirmishing over documents. But there are two lessons here worth noting. The first is that preparation matters. The board spent nearly two years corresponding with the commercial unit owner before issuing a single fine, and shared a draft of the new rule with the defendant before it was even adopted. That kind of documented, good-faith process is hard to attack in court — and appears to have served the board well so far. The second lesson is that rule drafting has consequences. The board's Rule 31 established an escalating fine structure that started at $500 per violation and climbed steeply with each subsequent infraction. Applied to nearly daily violations over three months, it produced a $427,500 claim. Boards considering similar enforcement rules should understand that clear, well-drafted language carries real financial weight — and that the other side will fight hard to have it thrown out.
Read full articleFirst published: Apr 2026
Paper Bags and Paper WarsTAKEAWAY For condo boards, this case is a reminder that the most mundane-seeming disputes — in this instance, a grocery store blocking a sidewalk during deliveries — can metastasize into years of costly litigation. The fight at 100 West 93rd Street has been going on since January 2022, and as of March 2026, the case has yet to be heard on its merits. It is still mired in pretrial skirmishing over documents. But there are two lessons here worth noting. The first is that preparation matters. The board spent nearly two years corresponding with the commercial unit owner before issuing a single fine, and shared a draft of the new rule with the defendant before it was even adopted. That kind of documented, good-faith process is hard to attack in court — and appears to have served the board well so far. The second lesson is that rule drafting has consequences. The board's Rule 31 established an escalating fine structure that started at $500 per violation and climbed steeply with each subsequent infraction. Applied to nearly daily violations over three months, it produced a $427,500 claim. Boards considering similar enforcement rules should understand that clear, well-drafted language carries real financial weight — and that the other side will fight hard to have it thrown out.
Read full articleFirst published: Apr 2026
The High Cost of Ignoring HabitabilityTAKEAWAY Water leaks are a fact of life in buildings, and mold often follows. When those conditions make an apartment unsafe or unlivable, as they did here, the resident will usually have a valid claim under the Warranty of Habitability. This is where the board in this case went seriously wrong. The board appears to have relied on its insurance carrier or adjuster for guidance on these legal questions rather than seeking proper legal counsel. It was a mistake to take the position that the Warranty of Habitability did not apply. Another incorrect assumption was arguing that its repair obligations were limited only to items that were “original” to the building. On top of that, it tried to condition Ms. Siegel’s ability to use her own contractor on her paying part of the co-op’s insurance deductible and the adjuster’s fee. In practical terms, these positions amounted to a refusal to make the necessary repairs. Because of that, Ms. Siegel was fully within her rights to reject the board’s proposal and proceed with repairs using her own contractor. Boards should take this as a clear warning. Repair obligations are not confined to a single “Repair” section of the proprietary lease. Most leases include additional provisions that address what happens when there is damage from events like leaks or flooding, and the Warranty of Habitability adds yet another layer of responsibility. These obligations work together, and they cannot be ignored or narrowly interpreted. The case ultimately reads like a textbook on the many legal problems that can arise from leaks and flooding, including evidence issues, lease interpretation, and how the Warranty of Habitability interacts with contractual repair obligations and established law. It stands as a strong cautionary example—and a reminder that boards need experienced legal advice when handling these situations.
Read full articleFirst published: Mar 2026
A Seven-Year (and Counting) Wait to RenovateTAKEAWAY One common mistake many co-op boards make is believing they have unfettered control over shareholder alterations. That is not necessarily true. Boards must review the proprietary lease and follow its exact language. If the lease requires board consent but states that consent cannot be unreasonably withheld, the board must proceed carefully. In that situation, the board may not be protected by the business judgment rule. A court has the authority to review the board’s decision to determine whether the board acted reasonably based on the facts. If the court finds that the board acted unreasonably, it may determine that the board breached both the proprietary lease and its fiduciary duty. The consequences for a board that does not act properly can be serious.
Read full articleFirst published: Mar 2026
251 Days Over DeadlineTAKEAWAY Boards should regularly update their alteration agreements to effectively manage risks associated with owner renovations such as damage to common elements, alignment with updated declarations and by-laws, incorporation of modern technology, and liability management. In this case, the record reflects that the managing member of the limited liability company that owns the unit is a real estate developer and that the owner decided that it would be cheaper to pay daily license fees to the board than to incur the costs involved in negotiating a second alteration agreement for the second phase of the work. But the unit owner may not have been counting on being required to pay the board’s attorneys’ fees which may exceed $100,000. This may not be the last decision in this litigation as the owner may proceed to litigate its potentially valuable counterclaims.
Read full articleFirst published: Mar 2026
Bathroom BattleTHE LESSON FOR BOARDS Boards retain broad discretion to enforce the rules and regulations of the building in different ways, as long as they do not single out a shareholder for harmful or selective enforcement and otherwise act in what they believe to be the best interests of the cooperative. Special arrangements with shareholders should be memorialized in writing in the interests of both parties in order to avoid questions from future boards who may not have been parties to the initial agreement.
Read full articleFirst published: Feb 2026
Packages, Protests, and Protected SpeechTAKEAWAY As noted by Judge Rosado, this is a case about “good corporate citizenship.” This decision reinforces that courts strongly protect resident and board communications with regulators, even when motivated by hostility toward a commercial neighbor. Boards do not incur tort liability simply by raising safety or quality of life issues with city agencies, even if those complaints lead to inspections, police visits, or business disruption. However, the opinion also implicitly warns against informal or personal tactics. Allegations about publishing a tenant’s phone number, encouraging harassment, or staging confrontations, while insufficient here, illustrate how easily governance disputes can escalate into reputational and litigation risk. Best practice remains disciplined procedural enforcement: written rule violations, documented inspections, coordinated communication through counsel, and reliance on formal regulatory mechanisms. Boards should avoid acting as neighborhood activists and instead operate as corporate fiduciaries. When boards remain institutional, neutral, and process-driven, they benefit from both substantive tort defenses and the powerful shield of New York’s anti-SLAPP statute.
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