New York City law required your landlord to test every apartment for lead paint. Many didn’t. If your building was missed, you may be entitled to a rent rebate — and a court order forcing the landlord to inspect, fix, and comply.
Local Law 31 of 2020 is part of New York City’s lead-paint laws, enforced by the Department of Housing Preservation & Development (HPD). It builds on Local Law 1 of 2004. Here is the plain-language version.
Landlords of covered buildings had to have a certified inspector use an XRF analyzer to test for lead-based paint in every dwelling unit and every common area — hallways, stairwells, laundry rooms, lobbies. A home test kit does not count. It must be a third-party, EPA-certified inspector.
It applies to residential buildings built before 1960, and to buildings built between 1960 and 1978 where the owner knows lead paint is present. Local Law 29 extended it to small landlords too, including one- and two-family rentals — any unit not lived in by the owner’s own family.
The testing had to be finished by August 9, 2025. That date is behind us. If your building still has not been tested — even though no child lives there — the landlord is now out of compliance and exposed to penalties and tenant claims.
A landlord’s lead-paint duties are ongoing, every single year. Under Local Law 1 and the related laws, the landlord must also:
Failing to test or comply is a Class “C” immediately hazardous violation, with civil penalties from $1,000 to $5,000 and more per violation — and it opens the door to the tenant claims described below.
The testing mandate did not depend on whether a child lived in your home, whether the building looks renovated, or how big the landlord is.
If your unit is not owner-occupied and it was not tested — that is the violation.
These laws exist because lead is poison — and children pay the price. Lead dust from old paint is invisible, and the damage it does cannot be undone.
Lead exposure in young children is linked to permanent brain and nervous system damage — lower IQ, learning and attention problems, and developmental delays. There is no safe level for a child.
The hazard is lead dust from paint on windows, doors and friction surfaces — it spreads even when the paint is not visibly peeling. That is exactly why the law requires testing, not guessing.
Lead also threatens pregnant tenants and unborn children, and it does not stop at one apartment — common areas, hallways and shared surfaces put every family in the building at risk.
You are not powerless here. New York’s lead-paint and housing laws give tenants real leverage against a non-compliant landlord.
A landlord who ignores the lead-paint laws and lets hazardous conditions stand has broken the warranty of habitability and the City’s housing laws. Tenants can bring that landlord before the court to force compliance and recover money.
New York’s housing laws allow a tenant who prevails to recover attorney’s fees from the landlord. That means the cost of holding the landlord accountable can fall on the landlord — not on you.
We do not just file a complaint and wait. We go after concrete results for the tenants in the building.
You paid full rent for an apartment the landlord failed to keep in legal, safe condition. We seek a rebate and abatement of rent for that non-compliance.
We ask the court to order the certified XRF lead-paint testing the landlord was supposed to complete — for your unit and the common areas.
If lead is found, we seek a court order requiring the landlord to remediate and abate the hazards properly, using certified, lead-safe work.
We seek an order putting the landlord back on the law’s track — annual notices, inspections, recordkeeping and monitoring going forward.
If there is no recovery, you owe Lake Legal no attorney’s fee. If we do recover, our fee is one-third (1/3) of all rent rebates and of all Lake Legal fees the landlord pays — including fees for putting the landlord back into future compliance.
And here is the part that matters most for you: that one-third fee is paid directly by the landlord — not taken out of your pocket and not deducted from what you receive.
The lead standard is the strictest in the country. NYC lowered the threshold that defines “lead-based paint” to 0.5 mg/cm² — which means more surfaces test positive than landlords expect.
HPD is enforcing harder. The City has been increasing lead-paint violations and audits, and turnover violations and neighborhood blood-lead data are now used to target buildings.
You may not be alone in your building. When a landlord skips testing, they usually skip it building-wide. These matters can move forward for a group of tenants together.
“No kids” is not a defense. The testing requirement applied whether or not a child under six lived in the unit. The landlord still had to test.
Remediation deadlines are real. For units where a young child lives, the law sets firm dates for actually abating the lead — not just testing for it.
Records matter. Keep your lease, rent receipts, any notices from the landlord, and photos of paint conditions. They help prove the case.
Use the 24/7 intake assistant or send us your building below. Either way a Lake Legal attorney follows up — the review is free and there is no fee unless we recover.