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A NYC compliance checklist for property managers

Last reviewed Oct 6, 2026 · Property management compliance

Three different checklists, not one. Taking a building on, running it, and handing it over each require different checks, and the handover one is the stage most often skipped — which is why inherited problems are so common.

Taking on a building

Do this in the first fortnight. Anything you find later will be assumed to have happened on your watch.

  1. Record the identifiers

    BIN, BBL, and how many buildings sit on the lot. Verify rather than assume.

  2. Take a baseline of everything open

    HPD violations by class, DOB violations, ECB summonses, OATH matters, open 311 requests. Date it and keep it. This is your evidence of what you inherited.

  3. Check the HPD registration is current

    A lapsed registration blocks certification, and discovering that while a correction window is running is avoidable.

  4. List every authorisation with an expiry

    DEP boiler certificates, periodic inspection filings, and for oil-heated buildings the state petroleum bulk storage registration.

  5. Find out where agency post currently goes

    Summonses are served to the address on file. If that is a previous agent, deadlines will pass without anyone seeing them.

Running it

  1. Check new records on a fixed cadence

    Weekly at minimum if you are doing it manually. The datasets update daily, so anything longer leaves windows closing unseen.

  2. Work the deadline list, not the violation list

    Correction dates, certification windows and hearing dates are what convert into money. The rest is context.

  3. Certify promptly and verify the status changed

    Per violation, within its window. Then confirm the record actually closed rather than assuming the filing was the end.

  4. Keep evidence by building

    Dated photographs, invoices and filing confirmations. Cheap to keep, expensive to reconstruct.

Handing it over

  1. Produce a current open-items list

    Everything outstanding, with identifiers and dates, as at the handover date.

  2. Flag anything mid-window

    A violation whose certification window is still running is the most dangerous thing to hand over silently.

  3. Update where agency correspondence is sent

    Including the HPD registration. Otherwise summonses continue arriving at your office for a building you no longer manage.

Common questions

How much of this is the agent’s job versus the owner’s?

It depends on the management agreement, which is worth reading on exactly this point. Agencies generally look to the registered owner regardless of private arrangements, so the owner retains the exposure even where the agent has the obligation.

What if the previous agent left no records?

Build the baseline from the public systems. The violation history is published, so the record can be reconstructed even when the files cannot.

Is a compliance calendar enough?

For recurring obligations with fixed dates, yes. It does nothing for the unpredictable half — new violations, complaints and summonses arrive on no schedule, which is why a calendar and a monitoring method solve different problems.

Official sources

Rules and figures change. Check anything you are about to act on against the agency itself.

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