Failure to Name Spouse on Golub Notice is Fatal

An issue of contention in Housing Court for many years has been whether a landlord must name a spouse on a notice of non-renewal of lease (“Golub Notice”) that serves as the predicate for a non-primary residence proceeding or owner use proceeding when that spouse is not listed in the lease but the landlord knows of his/her presence in the subject unit. A recent decision by New York County Housing Court Judge John Henry Stanley finds that the spouse must be named. Chundoff v. Collura, 36 Misc.3d 1233(A), 2012 N.Y. Slip.Op 51432(U) (N.Y.Civ.Ct, N.Y.Co. 2012).

In this case the tenant had requested that the landlord add the tenant’s spouse to the lease. When the next renewal term arrived the landlord did not send a lease renewal but instead served a Golub Notice alleging non-primary residence. The Golub Notice did not name the spouse.

When the landlord subsequently commenced the non-primary residence proceeding relying upon the Golub Notice the landlord failed to name the spouse about whom the tenant had informed the landlord. The tenant moved to dismiss the lawsuit alleging that the failure to name the spouse on the Golub Notice was a fatal defect not susceptible to amendment. The landlord argued that there was no need to name a spouse or family member not named on the lease.

Judge Stanley issued a decision/order in which he found for the tenant. It was determined that a spouse is entitled to receive a Golub Notice. While this decision will surely stand for that precedent, the decision/order was quite fact-laden and that the landlord had received a request to name the spouse on the lease in Judge Stanley’s eyes meant that the spouse should already have been on the lease notwithstanding the fact that a renewal term had not arrived until the time in which the landlord served the Golub Notice.

The lesson to be learned here is that landlords should (just to be safe) name spouses on Golub Notices.