Going Rogue Is Not the Way for Shareholders to Go

Feb. 4, 2016 — Here’s a new way to go rogue. A co-op shareholder in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn kept opening front lobby windows when the space got overheated or when cigarette smoke wafted in from a first-floor apartment. The managing agent sent a letter ordering the shareholder to leave the windows closed, explaining that rain could get in and make the lobby’s tile floors dangerously slick. When the shareholder kept opening the windows, the agent fined him $100.

And rightly so, says the Ask Real Estate column in the New York Times.

“Individual shareholders do not have any right to decide what common-area windows should or should not be opened,” says attorney Marc Luxemburg of the firm Gallett Dreyer & Berkey. “Particularly if there is a risk of harm to other shareholders.”

Instead of going rogue, the shareholder should write a letter to the board, expressing his concerns and asking the board to address them. Peter Varsalona, a principal at RAND Engineering & Architecture, says the building could add a ventilation system to improve air quality in common areas. Or the smoker could do the right thing and add an air filtration or ventilation system in his apartment.

But going rogue is not the way to go.