Renters’ woes soar as property owners hide their identities

Guardian -  Years before Emily Gallagher was elected to the New York state assembly in 2020, she attended a protest in Brooklyn. Los Sures, a neighborhood organization, had organized the protest for a tenant who was being harassed by their landlord. Storage unit Home, studio, a way to sell abandoned items: the many uses of self-storage. However, the tenant and their supporters had one big problem: they didn’t know where the landlord was. All of the rent checks had been made out to a limited liability company  and sent to a retail-store mailbox.

“We went to Mail Boxes Etc, because we didn’t actually know where the landlord’s office was, or where they worked, or who he was,” Gallagher said. “That really struck me. There’s this group that owes a lot of accountability, and we have no idea who they are and no way of holding them accountable.” The LLC is a business structure that can offer tax breaks, the protection of the owner’s personal assets from creditors and lawsuits, and importantly, anonymity from tenants or others. Creating one is a relatively easy process. In New York state, the application requires a unique business name, relatively minimal paperwork and a $200 fee sent to Albany. LLCs have been around since 1977, when Wyoming invented the concept as a state law. By 1996, every state had some version of LLC incorporation. But landlords’ use of LLCs surged with the Great Recession of 2008-09, as corporations snatched up hundreds of thousands of homes.