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The Best Deal in the City? UWS Room Rents for $99-a-Week

By Adam Nichols | March 6, 2011 11:12am | Updated on March 6, 2011 11:11am
The Imperial Court Hotel, where a room is being rented for just $99 a week.
The Imperial Court Hotel, where a room is being rented for just $99 a week.
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By Adam Nichols

DNAinfo News Editor

UPPER WEST SIDE — It's the best deal in the city.

An Upper West Side woman is renting her apartment in one of the city's most sought after neighborhoods for an unbelievable $99-a-week, the New York Post reported.

Dorothy Williamson, 70, pays just $398-a-month for her room at the Imperial Court Hotel, with the super-desirable address of 79th Street and West End Avenue.

The retired computer systems administrator, originally from Queens, checked into the hotel as a tourist in 2009, said the Post.

Two years later, she's still there, lving as a rent-stabilized permanent tenant.

She apparently took advantage of a law which applies to New York City's 30,000 Single Room Occupancies (SROs).

"An individual can become a permanent tenant by simply requesting a lease," Marti Weithman, director of the SRO Law Project, told the Post.

"If someone comes in and pays for a night, he or she can request a lease orally, or in writing. The very act of requesting a lease gives you statutory tenancy.

"When these places are being used as a hotel, tourists don't realize they have this option," Weithman said.

The Post described an SRO building as an affordable housing classification that falls between an apartment building and a hotel. They were established in the 1930s in an effort to supply temporary housing.

Most have now been converted into budget hotels.

Williamson had moved into the 200-square-foot room with a communal bathroom in 2009 while she hunted for an apartment. Lawyers told her about her residency rights after the landlord told her to leave.

"I had paid for the hotel room through April 4, and he told me I needed to get out because they'd booked the room for someone else," Williamson told the Post.

"That's when I gave him the lease request."

The request didn't go down well. Management called police and tried to have her arrested, she told the newspaper.

She won her case in civil court, where a judge ordered she shouldn't pay more than $99.52 a week - the amount paid by the room's most recent permanent resident.