New York woman says she found her name missing from her apartment’s records, and then she noticed the legal rent was about $200 lower

A New York woman said she had been living in a rent-stabilized apartment for years before she learned that the official records did not list her as the tenant. Court, who posts on TikTok as @court0o0, explained what she called an illusory tenant scam in a video that had gained about 40,800 views.

In the caption, she told people renting in New York City to stop and listen while she explained how the scam works, “so you don’t get scammed out of over $10k like i did!” She also wrote, “let’s start reporting landlords and holding them accountable 2026.”

Court said she has lived in a rent-stabilized apartment in the Bronx for about three years. She said she signed a lease with her landlord and paid rent each month to his management company, and she said she did not know anything was wrong until very recently.

She said a man’s name she did not know was listed as the tenant

Court said she did not find out until she went to housing court and the issue came up in the process. She said there might be no warning signs, and that she had none before the records came up.

She said she ordered the report from the Division of Housing and Community Renewal, or DHCR, and checked it. She said that from the day she moved in until the time she was still living there, a man’s name she had never heard of was listed as the legal tenant.

“I am the tenant of this apartment and I signed an official lease with the landlord,” she said. She added that she was not in a sublease or a sublet, and that she did not know the man or whether he was a real person. Lease disputes can leave tenants unsure of their standing, as when a New York man says he found super nice brokers and a good apartment but 4k later he is pretty much homeless.

She said she noticed right away that the legal rent on the report was about $200 less than she had been paying since she moved in. She said that for about three years she had been paying over $200 more a month than the legal rent listed for the apartment.

Court said the scam, as she described it, is when a landlord of a rent-stabilized apartment charges above the legal rent while sending DHCR a report that shows a different person and a different rent. She said the landlord may work with another person or list someone who is not real, and report that the legal rent is being charged to that person.

In her example, she said that if the legal rent is supposed to be $1,400, the report might show that amount and a tenant she called Janet Brown, while the person actually living there signs a separate lease and pays $1,600. She said Janet Brown might be someone the landlord worked with, or a made-up person, and she said she was still a little lost on exactly why landlords do it beyond charging above the legal rent.

She said tenants are legally allowed to request the paperwork for their apartment on the DHCR website, and that it arrives in the mail. She said people should look at who is listed as the legal tenant, the legal rent, any preferred rent, and the rental history. For tenants, the confusion can extend beyond the rent itself, as when a Washington woman confronted her landlord over moving a stranger into her son’s bedroom while she was still on the lease.

She said an unrecognized name for the time a person has lived there is a red flag, as is the person’s own name not appearing at all. She also said a legal rent listed much lower than what they pay, with no preferential rent or other reason, is a red flag.

Court said the paperwork should be taken to someone who works in housing court or legal aid. She said a tenant can file a complaint with the DHCR, and that if a landlord is found to have committed fraud or violated rent stabilization laws, it is possible the landlord will owe back what was overpaid.

She said that if someone was overcharged $200 a month, the landlord can owe up to three times that amount for each month of the overcharge. She said an investigation and a court case can take a long time and can take years, but she said it is worth it to know whether the rent is the legal rent and to report the landlord. She then said she realized how common she believes the issue is after she talked about it on social media and people reached out with similar stories.

Viewers responded with their own accounts and advice. One commenter urged her to pursue a lower rent and triple damages, and wrote that a friend had been through something similar. They wrote, “Ohhh, get yourself that lowered rent and triple damages, girl. This happened to a friend of mine and his landlord had to pay him something like $30K, and this was in the 90s.”

Another commenter suggested the overcharge be turned into a credit on the rent. They wrote, “They should decrease your rent and apply a credit so in essence you have a $7200 credit due.” A third commenter focused on how the extra money could add up across more than one apartment. They wrote, “getting away with pocketing 200$ a month is insane imagine how much hes making off everyone else.”

One viewer said tenants should check what a previous occupant paid before moving in. They wrote, “This is why before you move you go look up the hat the last tenet paid on those apartments bcaz they can’t do that.” Another pointed her toward free legal help. They wrote, “Look into low income legal assistance they will help with a lawyer etc.”