A landlord in New York can be sued when an unsafe condition in the building injures a tenant or a family member. State law requires the landlord to keep the property reasonably safe, and a lease does not erase that duty.
A broken stair, a collapsed ceiling, no heat, lead paint, or a security failure can each support a personal injury claim. That claim stands apart from any housing court dispute over repairs or rent.
Below: who can sue, what you must prove, the deadlines, and what a case can cover. The worst situations, a serious injury or a death, come with the shortest practical timelines.
What duty does a New York landlord owe me?
Two duties matter. First, every residential lease carries the warranty of habitability under Real Property Law § 235-b. Your apartment must be fit to live in, safe, and free of conditions dangerous to life, health, or safety. No lease can waive it. That warranty supports rent abatements and repair orders in housing court.
Second, and more important for an injury case, landlords of multiple dwellings must keep the building in good repair under Multiple Dwelling Law § 78. Broken handrails, defective wiring, missing smoke detectors, inadequate lighting, and unrepaired leaks that rot floors all fall under this duty. A landlord who knew about a dangerous condition, or should have known, and left it alone has been negligent.
What do I have to prove?
Four things, generally: there was a dangerous condition; the landlord created it or had actual or constructive notice of it; the landlord failed to fix it in a reasonable time; the condition caused your injury.
Notice is usually where these cases are won or lost. A 311 complaint, an HPD violation, a prior written repair request, or testimony from other tenants can show the landlord knew. Keep everything. including photographs, copies of complaints, and medical records from the day of the injury carry the case.
Being partly at fault does not bar you, which surprises many people. Premises claims follow pure comparative negligence under CPLR § 1411. If a jury finds you 30 percent responsible, your recovery drops by 30 percent. It is not eliminated. Car crashes run under a different standard; this rule applies to premises cases.
What deadlines apply?
A personal injury suit must generally start within three years of the injury under CPLR § 214. A wrongful death claim must be started within two years under EPTL § 5-4.1.
Public housing changes everything. If NYCHA or another public entity owns the building, a Notice of Claim is generally required within 90 days under General Municipal Law § 50-e. Ninety days vanishes fast Settle the Notice of Claim question first if a public landlord might be involved.
For children, deadlines can stretch, including in lead paint cases. Extensions are technical, though, and evidence does not wait. Conditions get repaired, painted over, or demolished. Early documentation beats any extension.
What can a lawsuit recover?
A premises injury case can cover medical bills, lost earnings, and pain and suffering. When a tenant can no longer work, future lost earnings and future medical care often dominate the case. One spinal surgery can exceed $100,000. Lifetime care after a serious burn or a fall down defective stairs costs far more.
In a death case, the family's recovery runs through the estate. That includes funeral costs, the financial support the person provided, and the loss to children and dependents. A personal representative must be appointed before suit is filed. That step is one reason the two-year wrongful death deadline is tighter than it looks.
These cases overlap with others we handle. Workers hurt making repairs in the same buildings may have Labor Law claims, a separate framework covered in our article on whether you can sue for OSHA violations. A worker injured by a building owner's negligence may also have rights beyond workers' compensation.
Can my landlord retaliate if I complain or sue?
No. Real Property Law § 223-b bars a landlord from evicting or penalizing a tenant for a good faith complaint about conditions or for asserting legal rights. An eviction attempt within one year of a protected complaint is presumed retaliatory. The landlord must rebut that presumption.
Fear of eviction keeps many tenants quiet about dangerous conditions. Silence protects nothing. The hazard remains, the notice record stays empty, and the landlord's position improves with every month that passes.
What should I do first?
Get medical care. Tell the doctor exactly how the injury happened, because the first medical record ties the injury to the condition. Photograph the hazard before anyone repairs it. Save every complaint you sent and every reply you received. Collect names of neighbors who saw the condition or complained themselves.
Do not give a recorded statement to the building's insurance carrier before you understand the claim. Carriers judge these cases on the notice record and the medical record. Your early words shape both.
An injury from something other than the building itself, such as a crash in the parking area or a delivery vehicle, may fall under motor vehicle law instead. That law has its own deadlines, explained on our car accident practice page.
How Schwartzapfel Holbrook approaches unsafe housing cases
We start with the building's full violation history: HPD records, DOB complaints, prior 311 calls, and earlier injuries at the same address. That history establishes notice, and notice wins these cases. We follow the medical record as it develops through the treating physicians' independent findings. Then we build the damages case around the whole picture, including future care and lost earning capacity.
Schwartzapfel Holbrook accepts a limited number of serious injury and wrongful death cases across New York City, Nassau County, and Suffolk County. Every case we take is prepared as if it will be tried. That preparation is what moves a carrier to evaluate the case seriously.
