Barry S. Schwartz, Esq.

Member: Perstare et Praestare (NYU Honor Society); History Honor Society; Red Dragon Society. President, Student Union. Attorney Schwartz has attained Martindale-Hubbell's highest rating for legal ability and ethical standards. Recipient, Alumni Award for Distinction in Scholarship and Student Activities. Listed: Lexis-Nexis Martindale Hubbell Bar Registry of Preeminent Lawyers, 2006-2009; Biographee in Marquis' Who's Who in American Law; Who's Who in America, 1990-2009. Associate Editor, Columbus School of Law of the Catholic University of America Law Review, 1973-1975. Faculty: NYCLA Jack Newton Lerner Lecture on Landlord Tenant Litigation: Trial Preparation and Trial Techniques, 2009; NYCLA Second Annual Commercial Real Estate Institute: Lease Negotiation and Commercial Real Estate Litigation, 2009; NYCLA First Annual Commercial Real Estate Institute: Lease Negotiation and Commercial Real Estate Litigation, 2008. Associate, Seavey, Fingerit, & Vogel, 1976-1981. Of Counsel, Seavey, Fingerit, Vogel, Oziel & Skoller, 1992-1997. Of Counsel, Seavey, Vogel & Oziel, 1998. General Counsel, West New York, New Jersey Rent Control Board, 1982-1986. Member, Board of Arbitrators, Civil Court of the City of New York Arbitration Program, 1980-1989.

Nature of Practice:

All phases of residential and commercial landlord-tenant litigation. On the owner's side, commencement and prosecution of commercial and residential nonpayment and holdover proceedings, including proceedings based upon non-primary residence, owner occupancy, subletting/assignment, nuisance, unauthorized alterations, inadequate insurance, etc; defense of tenant initiated (HP) actions, 7A proceedings, heat/hot water litigation commenced by HPD, defenses of all proceedings commenced by HPD; defense of Yellowstone injunction actions, collections, and most all litigation associated with the ownership and rental of real property; defense of traverse hearings.

On the tenant's side, defense and prosecution of claims compelling repairs, damages for breach of warranty of habitability, actual, partial and constructive evictions, unlawful evictions; prosecution of Yellowstone injunctive actions, assertion of appropriate jurisdictional defenses where necessary; defense of non-primary residency, owner occupancy proceedings; prosecution of 7A proceedings; overcharge and illusory tenancy claims; prosecution of traverse hearings.

Representation of HDFC's, TIL buildings, 7A administrators, receivers, tenant associations.

All aspects of residential rent regulation: rent control, rent stabilization, Section 8, Mitchell Lama, Section 217, ETPA, etc.

Appeals to the Appellate Terms and Appellate Divisions; Article 78 proceedings challenging orders of City or State agencies.

All phases of real property litigation including, but not limited to, actions in ejectment, partition, specific performance, rescission, reformation, nuisance, rent collections, declaratory judgments, breach of lease, prosecution and defense of mortgage foreclosures.

Negotiations of scores of commercial leases on behalf of restaurants, retail merchants, garment center wholesale showrooms, law firms, factories, franchise owners, nightclubs, and other businesses. Representation of purchasers and sellers of private homes, cooperative apartments, condominium units, multifamily dwellings from 3 to over 250 units, industrial parks, office buildings, factories, vacant land, farms and country estates.

All phases of representation of owners of small businesses, from incorporation to dissolution, including the purchase and sale of a business, shareholder and membership agreements, General counsel to conventional, Federal, City and State Mitchell-Lama housing cooperatives.

General litigation counsel to real estate management companies:

· Representation of dissolving small law firms and litigation of claims arising there from.

· Representation of claimants and respondents before the General Arbitration Council of the Garment Center Trades, American Arbitration Association.

· Representation of owners and contractors before the Construction Division of the American Arbitration Association.

· Litigation of commercial disputes between small businesses.

· Litigation compelling defense, indemnification and damages against insurance carriers.

· Litigation before administrative agencies of the City and State of New York, such as NYC Dept. of Housing, Preservation & Development, NYS Division of Housing & Community Renewal, NYC OATH, NYC ECB.

· General Counsel to one of the single largest owners of IMD loft buildings in NYC; representation of owner before the NYC Loft Board.

Recent Litigation Highlights:

· Landlord held justified in refusing to recognize commercial tenant's option to renew lease where tenant was habitually late in rent payments and had otherwise materially breached lease.

· Successful defense of business owner against former landlord's allegations of breach of lease and damages for restoration of premises charges.

· Successful defense of seller against purchaser's breach of contract and fraudulent misrepresentation claims in sale of residential real property.

· Successful prosecution of commercial summary proceeding against bar/restaurant engaging in nuisance/objectionable conduct affecting residential tenants of premises; successful defense of commercial tenant's appeal.

· Successful defense of landlord against claims by former tenant of fraudulent concealment in the rental of commercial premises; court rejected tenant's claims of constructive eviction and breach of covenant of quiet enjoyment.

· Successful representation of landlords in non-primary residence and owner's use proceedings summary proceedings.

· Successful representation of Pace University against landlord of building used for student housing and disengagement from long term lease.

· Successful prosecution of landlord's option to terminate lease despite scrivener's error in lease option to terminate clause.

· Successful defense of commercial tenant avoiding forfeiture provisions of RPAPL 749(3) in appeal to Appellate Division.

· Vacated a major Chinatown mall in order to allow the owner to gut renovate the structure.

· Successful use of forensic document examiner and scientific instruments to prove the fraudulent use of documents by a tenant against a landlord.

· Successful use of a forensic handwriting analysis to prove the handwriting of a tenant who sent harassing and vexatious letter and cards to other tenants, in a nuisance holdover proceeding.

· Extension of the right to cure to a tenant who failed to renew a rent stabilized lease in the Second Department

· Successful defense of small business owners against unconscionable real estate tax and porter's wage escalations.

· Successful appeal of trial court's refusal to impose an attorney's lien on settlement proceeds wrongfully paid directly to attorney's client in violation of fee agreement.

· Successful defense of rent claims by tenant shareholders (cooperatives) who resided under defectively installed roof system, tenants in luxury apartment house next to excessively noisy machine room, tenants who did not receive adequate heat and hot water, tenants in high rise plagued by constant elevator breakdowns, tenants harassed by landlord who sought to vacate building.

· Successful appeal of an owner's denial of a Certificate of No Harassment by Article 78 proceeding.

Early Career Highlights:

· General landlord-tenant litigation counsel to Sol Goldman, one of NYC's largest landlords (1977-81).

· Successful defense of JI Sopher & Company, NYC's largest residential brokerage, in a federal housing discrimination jury trial (1977).

· Successful defense of one of NYC's most notorious landlords against various proceedings brought by the NYC Dept. of Housing, Preservation & Development, including 7A proceedings, comprehensive proceedings for fines and penalties, proceedings for orders to correct housing code violations, contempt of court applications (1981-1984).

· Successful defense of well-known real estate management firm against actions taken by the NYC Dept. of Housing, Preservation & Development, as a result of firm's unwitting relationship with a major NYC slumlord (1984-86).