Imperiled Immigrants Live Underground And Off The Books

For $1,200 a month, Miguel Diaz, his mother and his niece rent a small apartment as the third family living in a two-family home in Corona.
More accurately, they rent the top floor of a house. There is no door. They simply walk up the stairs from the entryway into a narrow hallway, steps away from the kitchen. To the right is the bedroom the two women share. To the left are Diaz's bedroom and a bathroom.
The building's first floor houses another family and the two owners live in the basement, Diaz said. Yet according to the New York City Department of Buildings, the 16-by-38-foot house is classified as a two-family dwelling, making it illegal for anyone to live in the basement. Inspectors responding to a complaint in 2003 found that the basement was used for storage. Now, lace curtains hang from its windows, blocking any view into a room accessible only by outdoor stairs.
The building is one of thousands of illegal conversions in Corona and surrounding areas. They are usually cramped, makeshift living quarters in basements or attics that often violate health and fire safety codes. Yet, experts say, a severe housing shortage and the high cost of rent often put impoverished tenants at the mercy of their landlords.
Diaz and his family, for instance, moved into their current home after leaving another apartment when the landlord raised the rent. Diaz, 25, said he is unemployed but pays the rent by delivering papers, off the books. The women chip in with money from babysitting.
&#8220It's small,” Diaz said of his new living quarters, where little pictures of Jesus and Mary partially cover the hallway's chipped paint, and a wooden sign reading &#8220Dominican Republic” hangs in the kitchen. &#8220But things will get better.”
In 2004, the Department of Buildings received 9,316 complaints of illegal conversions in Queens, out of a citywide total of 15,656. Between July 2004 and June 2005, 889 complaints were in the area covered by Community Board 4, which includes parts of Corona and Elmhurst.
An &#8220illegal conversion” means creating an additional housing unit in an existing building without approval from the department. Typically, this involves adding an apartment in the basement, attic or garage of a one- or two-family home. It can also mean dividing a one- or two-family home into a number of separate units. A property owner found to have an illegal conversion can be fined $250 to $2,500 for a first violation, with fines of up to $15,000 for subsequent offenses, according to the office of Queens Borough President Helen Marshall.
The main reasons that so many illegal conversions exist in Queens are high real-estate prices coupled with the low income of many residents, a significant number of whom are undocumented immigrants.
According to Italiano, a new three-family home in Corona costs approximately $950,000. To pay the mortgage, homeowners must rent apartments out at high costs – around $2,000 a month for a three-bedroom apartment. In a district where more than a third of the population receives welfare payments or other federal income support, many residents cannot afford the rent and so they double up with another family. Many live in illegal, usually unsafe, basement or attic apartments that can cost between $800 and $900 a month, according to Jenny Laurie, director of the Metropolitan Council on Housing, a New York tenant union.
According to Lt. Michael McLoughlin of Fire Engine 289 in Corona, illegal conversions are overcrowded firetraps, with only one exit and with no smoke or carbon monoxide detectors. Nor do they comply with city regulations regarding necessary amounts of air or light.
In addition to the physical dangers, tenants in illegal conversions are also easily victimized by their landlords, who may deny basic services with the knowledge that tenants have no one to turn to and nowhere to go. Landlords may lock tenants out or threaten to cut off utilities.
According to Laurie of the Met Council, common complaints include flooding in a basement apartment, fumes from living next to a water heater or boiler, fires when all of a family's appliances are hooked up to an overloaded extension cord, and lack of air circulation.
Laurie advises tenants living in illegal conditions to withhold their rent, since landlords can not take them to housing court. &#8220Start saving the money and look for another apartment,” she said.