Homeowners Get Answers To Rental Registry Questions In East Hampton

Newly adopted legislation in East Hampton Town requiring homeowners who rent their homes to register them with the town has caused a flurry of confusion and anxiety for some residents.

Basically, every homeowner is scared, that's the reaction," said Diane Shifman, licensed sales associate with Rosehip Partners Real Estate in East Hampton. "They're just nervous about being compliant with the law."

"People are very concerned. They understand the law, but they believe it's an invasion of privacy. There's mixed responses," added her colleague and real estate agent Kevin Flaherty.

In an effort to address these concerns, the town hosted multiple workshops over the last two weeks for both real estate professionals and homeowners, clarifying the law and answering questions.

Going into affect on May 1, the rental registry law requires homeowners to fill out a form and register with the Town Building Department for $100 for a two-year term. Among other provisions, the landlord must certify the number of legal bedrooms in the house and the square footage in each. They also must certify that the house meets certain state-mandated safety standards, such as the proper number of smoke and carbon monoxide detectors.

On Wednesday, January 27, Town Attorney Michael Sendlenski and Betsy Bambrick, director of code enforcement, fielded questions from the general public, which ranged from concerns about privacy to what a homeowner will be liable for.

The question that kicked off the Q&A was whether this new legislation allows town officials to do random home inspections.

"This law does not allow for code enforcement to just all of a sudden disregard the Constitution and just come into your house," said Ms. Bambrick.

"We're not going to contact you to do an inspection," Mr. Sendlenski added later. "There is no inspection required. The only inspection required is this form that you do yourself … The town is not going to come inspect your house for this rental registry."

However, should code enforcement have a reason to inspect a home—because of a neighbor's complaint, for example—and find something out of compliance, then a notice of violation will be issued. The homeowner will have a period of time in which to fix that violation before a re-inspection is scheduled.

"If you don't get into compliance within that time frame, it's only then that we'll take you to court," said Mr. Sendlenski.

One person wanted to know if the town protects the privacy of landlords or if it sells the information collected from this registry. Freedom of Information laws allow some of the information to be made public, Mr. Sendlenski explained, but the town does not sell information.

Another asked why the town required landlords to provide the square footage of each bedroom in their rental homes.

"The square footage goes to the calculation of the maximum occupancy for a bedroom," Mr. Sendlenski said. According to state law, in order for a room to be occupied as a bedroom, there must be a minimum of 70 square feet for one person, 100 square feet for two people and 150 square feet for three people.

The discussion moved to permissible rental situations and in what ways homeowners can be held liable. An audience member asked if short-term rentals are prohibited under the new law.

"This is a general misconception. Nothing in the rental registry law has changed any of the uses allowable for a house," said Mr. Sendlenski. For more than two decades, the town code has allowed homeowners to have as many as two rentals of 14 days or less within a six-month period.

"On the third rental, it's considered, pursuant to the code, that you've converted the single-family house into a motel in violation of the code," said Mr. Sendlenski. This applies to new tenants as well as repeat tenants.

Another asked about the protocol for last-minute tenants. For example, if a renter requested a house on a Saturday morning and came to stay that afternoon, Town Hall would be closed. How would the homeowner submit new tenant information on time?

Homeowners should mail the form in as soon as there is a new tenant, Ms. Bambrick explained. As long as code enforcement has proof that the homeowner sought to comply with the law, court action will likely not be necessary.

One audience member posited the following question: If a homeowner believes he or she is renting to just one couple, but it ends up becoming a share house, who is in violation?

"You’ll have provisions in your lease to deal with that situation," limiting the number of people who can rent and specifically prohibiting share houses, said Mr. Sendlenski. "That will be your best defense coming to us as code enforcement and prosecutors."

One of the last questions was about advertising rental homes. Ads must include the rental registry number, but are homeowners liable if online real estate platforms, such as Zillow and Trulia, mine that data and fail to include the registry number?

As long as the house has been registered with the town, the homeowner will not be in violation. "If we open up a case, say we're trolling Airbnb looking for excessive turnovers … and we see your house is there, but it doesn't have the rental registry number, as we do our investigation, we're going to know that you got one, so you wouldn't get a ticket necessarily for that entity posting without the number," said Ms. Bambrick.

"I have mixed feelings," said one attendee, Jody Sutter, who rents her East Hampton home year-round, after the session. "As a homeowner, I’m concerned that I may be liable under the law for things that my tenants do, and that’s my biggest concern, not being able to defend myself in the way that I feel that I need to when the tenants are the ones breaking the law."

On the other hand, Ms. Sutter also acknowledged that the registry could aid her in making a case against a bad tenant.

"My takeaway is that most of what they want is to make sure that people are complying with the safety of their residence for their rental," said another attendee, Chris Tucci.

"The only thing that I found to be a little strange is to have to maintain an update of how many people are occupying a residence," he added, noting it can be difficult for some as situations can change quickly. "For some reason, it struck me as a little overbearing by government to have to know that number."

"I have mixed feelings about the rental registry as a broker," said Ann Rasmussen, who works at Brown Harris Stevens and did not attend the workshop. "On the one hand, it’s a good thing, because if the house is registered, you know you’re putting a tenant in a safe property that meets code.

"On the other hand, I don’t think the Building Department has the capacity to get thousands of landlords even their current CO—forget about a new one—or really enforce the law."

"The sense of change brings uncertainty," Ms. Sutter concluded. "I think probably we all just want to know that this is going to help us more than hurt us."

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