What constitutes and occupant?

[Chase743]

What is the name of your state? NY

My landlord recently approached me about how they were "concerned" that my girlfriend spends so much time at my apartment (2nd floor of their house - legal). She probably stays 2 - 3 nights per week, but she does have her own place. She doesn't have any mail come to my house, or anything like that.

I was reading the NYS laws, and I noticed that if you have two people on a lease (which I do - me and my roommate), that you can not have any other occupants, other than family/children.

I don't consider her an occupant, and I can't believe that my landlord would give me a hard time about this, but they are very intrusive and disrespectful (I'm sure there are plenty of things that they aren't doing "by-the-book"). I don't know if I can tolerate them much longer, but I want to make sure that I'm on solid legal footing in case there is a messy split (between me and the landlord).

Thoughts? Thanks so much!

 

[BL]

Read the Laws Further ,then let us know .. There is no law prohibiting over night " guest " , and normally you can have guest up to 2 weeks .

But , by have the same guest 3 X times a week , your LL has a legit concern . Be prepared to move when the time occurs .

 

[Chase743]

Thanks. I looked in NYS Real Property Law Sec. 235-f, and an Occupant is defined as follows:

"Occupant" means a person, other than a tenant or a member of a tenant's immediate family, occupying a premises with the consent of the tenant or tenants."

I'm not sure what to make of it. I guess the phrase "occupying a premises" is somewhat debatable. I'm not an attorney, so I don't know.

Generally, I am more than willing to abide by any reasonable requests that my LLs make, but they have asked me to "not have more than two cars parked on their block", since the neighbors don't like it. But, the neighbors have their guests park all over the place, including in front of our house. They also ask us to shovel their driveway (which we are not allowed to use) when it snows, and many others.

Believe me, we are on our way out, and my roommate and I have already decided to stop honoring their eggregious requests, but I just want to make sure that we aren't doing anything that could leave us exposed, just in case there is a messy split. I just wanted to research the issue of my girlfriend staying, just to be sure.

Anyway, I apologize for going off on a tangent. Thanks for the advice! Any additional thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks again!