259 Fourth Ave. v Williams
2 Misc 3d 127(A)
N.Y. App. Term 2nd
2003
Check Treatment

259 FOURTH AVENUE LLC, Respondent, v SONIA RIVERA WILLIAMS, Appellant. 259 FOURTH AVENUE LLC, Respondent, MARGARET BELTON, Appellant.

NO. 2003-226 K C

Appellate Term, Second Department

December 22, 2003

2003 NY Slip Op 51685(U)

PESCE, P.J., ARONIN and PATTERSON, JJ.

Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the Official Reports.

Decided on December 22, 2003

SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK

APPELLATE TERM : 2nd and 11th JUDICIAL DISTRICTS

Consolidated appeal by tenants from an order of the Civil Court, Kings County (M. Pinckney, J.), entered December 20, 2002, in summary proceedings, denying their consolidated motion to dismiss the petitions.

Appeal unanimously dismissed.

No appeal lies from the intermediate order as the right to appeal therefrom terminated with the entry of the final judgments on February 3, 2003 and March 10, 2003 (as amended May 3, 2003) (

). Although the stipulations upon which the final judgments were entered reserved tenants’ right to appellate review of the merits of the contested order, tenants’ failure to appeal from the final judgments precludes such review (cf. CPLR 5501 [a] [1]).

We note that were the appeal properly before us, we would conclude that the court below properly rejected tenants’ claim that the premises constitute an integrated multiple dwelling subject to the Rent Stabilization Law. Adjoined or contiguous structures may be deemed a regulated multiple dwelling when the “indicia of common facilities, common ownership, management and operation.. . warrant treating the housing as an integrated unit” (

). Because the cases emphasize “various combinations” of such indicia, “no one factor can be said to be determinative” (
;
). The two structures stand one behind the other on a single block and tax lot, separated by a 21-foot courtyard. Aside from shared water and electric service, the dissimilarly configured buildings (one contains two apartments and a commercial storefront, the other consists of four apartments) have no common structural attributes. Although the buildings have long been jointly owned and managed, it is well-settled that such ownership, a common block and tax lot, and one or more shared utilities do not compel an inference of integration (e.g.
;
;
;
) particularly where, as here, the evidence of the buildings’ structural independence predominates (
;
). We note that while common ownership and management are factors relevant to this determination, the mere accumulation of attributes inherent in such matters as joint financing, insurance, and bookkeeping, does not strengthen the case for integration.

Decision Date: December 22, 2003