An apartment building in Williamsburg.
By COLE SINANIAN and JACK DELANEY | news@queensledger.com
Brokers working for landlords who say they’ve never heard of them. Unlisted apartments with sketchy caveats. Scribbled-in “processing” charges worth hundreds of dollars.
It’s been a month since the FARE Act eliminated forced broker fees. But amid a tight housing market and confusion among tenants about what is and isn’t legal, it appears that many brokers and landlords are finding ways around this new legislation.
“Nothing’s really changed since the law went into effect,” said Michael Corley, a Brooklyn-based broker — though he believes it’s necessary, and that it could benefit both brokers and tenants if thoroughly enforced.
The bill, which sought to prevent prospective tenants from being forced to pay a fee for a broker they didn’t hire, was introduced in February 2024 and took effect on June 11, 2025, leaving plenty of time for speculation: many brokers and landlords, particularly the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY), warned — or, from tenant organizers’ perspective, threatened— that the new law would lead to higher rents. It would encourage landlords to add the cost of hiring a broker to monthly rent, they said, and reduce the number of listings on platforms like StreetEasy as landlords stopped hiring brokers to market their properties.
In response, lawmakers and tenant advocates argued that even if landlords baked hired broker fees into monthly rent, it would improve housing accessibility, as it would reduce the high cost of signing a lease that was often a barrier to entry for low-income tenants. Many renters pay upwards of $10,000 in fees and deposits to move into a new apartment.
The upfront nature of these costs matters: at a City Council hearing last year, dozens of tenants testified that high broker fees were locking them into subpar or outright dangerous housing situations, and in some cases pushing them out of the city altogether. Annie Abreu, a law student, said that it would be difficult for her and her mother “to leave our current insecure living situation and find an apartment in my neighborhood as soon as I start working, because having to pay [these] fees in one go is basically impossible.” Others, like Augustina Velez and Logan Ferris, said they accepted poor conditions because their landlords knew they would not be able to move out. The FARE Act, they hoped, would even the playing field.
So what’s the reality? Early signs suggest that rents haven’t skyrocketed, despite an initial spike. But while there have been success stories of tenants gaining more mobility, costs haven’t plunged, either, thanks to a “wild west” of scams and workarounds. The Brooklyn Star spoke to more than a dozen tenants and brokers about their experiences since the FARE Act went into effect, and identified a series of recurring practices — some new, some old — that, in effect, continue forcing tenants to pay for brokers despite the new regulations.
Below, you’ll find (1) a guide to the broad categories of violations, and (2) an explanation of what you can do if you believe you’ve fallen into one of these traps.
1. What To Look Out For
Gatekeeping
Almileno Situmorang, a financial analyst originally from Indonesia, found a unit near McCarren Park, listed by the Brooklyn-based rental agency Rentopia, that seemed to fit his needs. In the end, the price wasn’t right, but the agent claimed to have a different unit that might interest Situmorang — a rent-stabilized apartment at 58 Bushwick Ave in Williamsburg that was unlisted on StreetEasy. After Situmorang toured the apartment, the agent told him that if he wanted to apply, Situmorang would have to sign an agreement with Rentopia, hire the agent as his broker and pay the broker fee himself.
But while he was touring the unit, Situmorang found the phone number for the property management company, Secured Management NY, which owns the building under the holding company “Bushwick Realty II LLC.” He called, inquired about available units at 58 Bushwick, and was promptly told to contact Rentopia. When Situmorang questioned the legality of forcing a tenant to pay for a broker that appeared to have been hired by the owner, the receptionist at Secured Management NY doubled down and told him to “just give Rentopia a call.”
Not wanting to pass up a rent-stabilized, off-market unit in a desirable area, Situmorang and his fiance applied for the apartment through Rentopia. After they applied, his fiance called Secured Management NY as a test, and was told there were no units available.
“That’s probably because we had already applied for the unit,” Situmorang said. “So they are working with Rentopia.” To Situmorang, it seemed clear that Secured Management NY did not want to pay the Rentopia agents who were marketing its properties, and hoped to get tenants to pay the agents by forcing them to apply through Rentopia.
“It’s a desirable place to live,” he said, “so they know they can probably get away with finding someone who’s desperate enough to pay the fee and do it under the table illegally.”
A number of ads can be found on Craigslist that seem to utilize a similar strategy. One, posted on June 29, advertises a “MASSIVE — RENT STABILIZED — ONE BEDROOM APARTMENT IN AMAZING LOCATION in SUNSET PARK.”
But at the bottom of the page is the following: “I have access to many rent-stabilized apartments across NYC! Due to the FARE Act, this ad is not for a specific unit — but if you’d like to hire me as your tenant agent, I can help you find great options. A broker fee of 8–15% of annual rent applies.”
On Streeteasy, a unit on 276 Suydam Street in Bushwick listed by a company called Bohemia Realty Group included an image with the message, “Think you’ve seen it all? You haven’t. We’ve got access to thousands of listings that are not advertised anywhere due to the FARE Act. Hire one of our savvy, friendly agents as your tenant rep and unlock every option that fits your budget, location and vibe.” The message has since been taken down, although the listing remains.
This strategy isn’t always out-and-out malicious — as reported by Hell Gate, many brokers are unsure of the legal landscape themselves and believe that advertising without specific addresses is allowed. “Everyone is a little on edge,” Curbed concurred. And Anna Klenkar, a broker who has been an outspoken advocate of the FARE Act, told the Star that there could be a niche for agents who assist tenants in a more holistic way.
But under the new law, brokers are not permitted to make hiring them a condition for closing on an apartment, which anecdotal evidence suggests is happening frequently. Broadly, if a landlord is relying on a broker to market their property and tenants cannot access it without going through them, the law indicates that the landlord should foot the bill.
“If a landlord gives a broker permission to show their unit, that generally counts as hiring and the landlord is legally required to pay the fee,” confirmed Fox, who helped architect the FARE Act.
The “Bait-and-Switch”
Situmorang’s story was similar to those of other tenants the Star interviewed, which follow an old playbook. Another prospective tenant, who has asked to be kept anonymous, showed up for a tour at the address of a Jackson Heights apartment they had encountered on Zillow, only to find what appeared to be a family of four living there. They called the agent, who worked for a company called Contact Realty, and was told that the actual address was a few blocks away. The address was completely different from the one listed on Zillow, although the photos from the listing matched the second apartment. After the tour, the agent told them that they wouldn’t have to pay the broker’s fee until they signed the lease, although they should pay it quickly to “take the unit off the market.”
“We felt pressured to send them the broker’s fee as soon as possible to ‘take it off the market,’ even though the thing they would be taking off the market was already off market,” the prospective tenant said.
They continued: “We got the bait-and-switch of being shown a place, then being brought to a different place and that’s how they justified the broker’s fee.”
To an even greater degree than the previous examples of gatekeeping, this is clearly illegal — twice over, in fact. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has consistently cracked down on the practice as false advertising, and it would also violate the FARE Act if the tenant is being forced to hire a broker.
Mystery Fees and Double Listings
Other tenants reported misleading practices of nebulous legality that were more difficult to categorize. Another StreetEasy post listed by the company SERHANT for a unit at 350 East 62nd Street in Manhattan includes more than $1,000 in fees, including a $500 “annual lease fee,” a $575 “processing fee,” and a $65 “digital submission fee.”
These fees were illegal even before the FARE Act passed: in 2019, a state law mandated that landlords cannot charge tenants more than $20 for application fees.
A newer development is the phenomenon of double listings.
Allia Mohamed, founder of the listing platform openigloo, shared a typical example in a reel on Instagram: “$5,495 with Broker Fee,” the screenshot reads, “OR $6,400 & NO BROKER FEE — BRAND NEW APARTMENT.”
Commenting below Mohamed’s video, user @katesatthebeach highlighted a variant of this that she experienced during the initial week after the FARE Act’s implementation. In her telling, she replied to a listing on Zillow and was told that the unit was taken, but that there was a similar unit available. The only catch? The going rent was $3600, but if she agreed to hire the broker they claimed they could reduce it to $3300. (She declined.)
Ghost Brokers, Rogue Agents
Another issue is that open listings — a system in which any interested broker can pick up keys to show an apartment, without dealing closely with the management company — create legal grey areas at best, and at worst allow landlords to claim plausible deniability if a broker pushes tenants to pay their fee.
Ruth Windberg was browsing StreetEasy when an almost-too-good-to-be-true listing appeared. The apartment was at 307 Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights, and the broker, who was from a virtual brokerage firm called eRealty Advisors, emailed her just moments later and they agreed to meet for a tour. The listing included no information about fees, and when Windberg asked the broker directly he dodged her question.
But after the tour concluded, Windberg told the broker she wanted to apply, at which point he informed her she must pay him a 15% broker fee, claiming he had not been directly hired by the landlord, a Brooklyn-based management company called AH Realty. Frustrated, Windberg walked out and called the management company. The woman who answered told her there were currently no vacant units at 307 Eastern Parkway and that she had never heard of the broker. An argument ensued and ended when Windeberg threatened to report the company to the DCWP as a FARE Act violation. Later she texted the same thing to the broker, who quickly backtracked: “that is unnecessary this property is a no fee,” he texted her. On the phone, he told her that a friend had given him access to the apartment and he did not know it was no fee.
“He did a complete 180,” Windberg said.
Technically, the law includes a “rebuttable presumption” — guilty until proven innocent, essentially — that if a broker lists a unit online, the landlord is liable for their fee.
Other stories shared with the Star confirm that this is not an isolated instance. For example, a licensed real estate broker named Raymund Ramirez Sykes told the Star he found a broker on Facebook who was advertising his services for a rental property that Sykes had already been hired for.
“I asked, ‘Why are you presenting a tenant agreement?’” Sykes said. “‘They’re already signed off to me. Who are you’?”
These tactics have existed for years, noted Klenkar, but increased scrutiny under the FARE Act has brought them out into the open.
2. What You Can Do
Once you’ve identified that a broker or landlord is likely violating the FARE Act — or other laws, such as the cap on application fees — the next step is filing an official complaint. There are two channels to go through, the first being the city.
The NYC Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP) is responsible for enforcing the FARE Act, which lays out fines for offending brokers: $750 for the first violation, $1,800 for the second, and $2,000 for every additional violation within a two-year period.
You can report potential violations online at nyc.gov/site/dca/consumers/file-complaint.page, or by calling 311, though that can be convoluted.
As of July 7, DCWP had received 562 complaints from tenants related to the FARE Act, spokesperson Michael Lanza said. The agency is still assessing the claims, however, and has yet to impose any fines.
Lanza stressed that many of the complaints they’ve received thus far are incomplete, and that the tenants often don’t respond when his colleagues attempt to follow up. “We ask any New Yorker who is submitting a complaint about the FARE Act to provide as much evidence as possible (text messages, screenshots, receipts, contact information),” he said, “and to please include the name and contact information of the broker if available.”
But the agency has roughly 20 staff members on its consumer services team that review all complaints DCWP receives, which to Klenkar seemed meager: “This law needed to have a clear enforcement mechanism,” she said, “and it does — but it’s just not being staffed the way that it needs to.”
With that in mind, Corley recommends filing a second complaint at the state level. (To do so, visit dos.ny.gov/preliminary-statement-complaint-0).
“Unlike local enforcement, the state looks at this in clear black and white,” he said. “If a law passed and you are failing your public duty as a fiduciary by obfuscating disclosure that impacts the consumers’ rights, your license can be taken, and if there’s a pattern of abuse, it can be revoked. [Agents] are afraid of that, because it can happen.”
A final course of action could be a lawsuit: the FARE Act creates a private cause of action, which allows individuals to sue in civil court over alleged violations.
