What it does
You answer four questions:
- How many bedrooms your apartment has.
- Whether it is rent stabilized or controlled, a co-op or condo, income-restricted, none of these, or you are not sure.
- Whether the owner lives in a small building, whether the building got a new certificate of occupancy in 2009 or later, or none of these.
- Your monthly rent.
The screener tells you one of three kinds of answer:
- Covered. Good Cause Eviction applies, unless your landlord proves the small-landlord exemption. Only a landlord can show that, so the screener never guesses it.
- Exempt. One of the law's exemptions applies, and the screener names it with its citation.
- Not yet known. One fact decides the answer, and the screener says which one.
How the answer is made
The screener does not ask an AI to interpret the law. It applies the text of New York Real Property Law sections 211 through 218, copied word for word from the State Senate's site, and the fair market rent for your bedroom count from HUD's own published file. The same steps run the same way every time.
What it does not do
- It covers New York City only, and only the Good Cause Eviction Law.
- It does not give legal advice or tell you what to do in a case.
- It does not decide questions the law leaves to a judge, such as whether a renovated building's new certificate counts. It shows those as open questions.
Example outcomes (synthetic)
- A two-bedroom at $2,400 in a large building with no special status: covered unless the landlord proves the small-landlord exemption.
- An apartment in an owner-occupied building with 10 or fewer units: exempt under Real Property Law 214(2).
- A tenant who is not sure of the rent: the high-rent exemption is not yet known.
[Check your apartment]
--- Claim sources: scripts/verification_reports/sce_nyc_tenant_law/. Every sentence above must map to a report there before publication.