How to Fill Out and File Form RA-90: Tenant Lease Renewal Complaint

Form RA-90 is the complaint a rent-stabilized tenant in New York files with Homes and Community Renewal (HCR) when a landlord fails to offer a renewal lease or fails to return a signed copy of one you already executed. You submit it by mail to HCR’s Office of Rent Administration at Gertz Plaza in Jamaica, Queens, or online through the Rent Connect portal. There is no filing fee, and most of the work is gathering your lease dates and any proof you asked the landlord for the renewal first.

When You Have Grounds to File

Two situations trigger an RA-90, and the form asks you to pick one.

The first is a landlord’s failure to offer a renewal. In New York City, the owner must send a written renewal offer between 150 and 90 days before your current lease expires, by mail or personal delivery. Outside the city, in counties under the Emergency Tenant Protection Act, the window is 120 to 90 days and the notice must go by certified mail after the owner signs and dates it. Once the 90-day mark passes with nothing in your hands, you have a valid complaint. HCR recommends contacting the owner directly to request the lease before filing.¹

The second is a failure to furnish a signed copy. After you sign and return a renewal offer, the owner has 30 days to send back a fully executed copy showing both signatures and the lease start and end dates. If that window closes empty, you can file.²

One deadline cuts the other way. When your landlord does send the renewal offer, you have 60 days to sign and return it. Miss that, and the fault flips to you.³

Pick the Right Version First

HCR publishes two versions. The standard Form RA-90 is for rent-stabilized apartments inside New York City, governed by the Rent Stabilization Code. Form RA-90 ETPA is for rent-stabilized apartments outside the city, in the suburban counties covered by the Emergency Tenant Protection Act — primarily Nassau, Westchester, and Rockland. Both forms collect the same information. The difference is the legal framework cited on the face of the form, and filing the wrong one will slow your case.⁴

Filling Out the Form

Both versions come as fillable PDFs on the HCR website. Borough and district rent offices no longer accept paper drop-offs, so plan on mail or online.⁵ The form has three parts.

Part I: Identifying Information

Your full name, mailing address, apartment number, and phone number, plus the owner or managing agent’s name, business address, and phone number. There is a separate field for the building address if it differs from where you receive mail.³ Pull the owner’s details from your most recent lease, a rent bill, or the building’s registration in HCR’s online tenant tools.

Part II: Rental History

This section builds the record of your tenancy. Give either the date you moved in under a written lease (with its start date, end date, and monthly rent) or the date you moved in without one and your initial rent. Then fill in the term of your most recent lease — its length, start and end dates, and monthly rent. The form also asks whether your rent is current, whether you receive a SCRIE or DRIE rent-freeze exemption, and whether you participate in Section 8.⁶ If you no longer have a copy of your lease, request your apartment’s rent history from HCR before filing.

Part III: Nature of Complaint

Check the box that matches your situation: the owner refuses to give you a renewal, or the owner failed to furnish you with a signed copy. Pick only one. Checking both when only one is true muddies the complaint.³ Sign and date at the bottom.

What to Send With It

The form alone opens your case. Evidence wins it. Attach copies of any letters or emails you sent the landlord asking for the renewal. A certified mail receipt carries real weight because it proves the owner had notice and a chance to comply. If you already signed and returned a renewal offer, include a copy of that signed form and any delivery confirmation. Send copies, keep the originals, and store a full duplicate of everything you file.

How to Submit

By mail: DHCR – Office of Rent Administration, Gertz Plaza, 92-31 Union Hall Street, Jamaica, NY 11433.⁵
Online: HCR’s Rent Connect portal accepts complaints, document uploads, and case-status checks. Reach it from the tenant resources page at hcr.ny.gov.⁷

Once HCR receives your complaint, it opens an official case file and assigns a docket number you can use to track progress.

What HCR Does Next

HCR serves the complaint on the owner, who then has time to respond — either by producing the lease or by submitting a written answer. A Rent Administrator in the Office of Rent Administration handles the exchange.

If the Rent Administrator finds a violation, HCR issues an order directing the owner to furnish the lease. Two consequences give the order teeth. If the owner doesn’t comply within 20 days, HCR denies all rent guideline increases on the apartment until the fully executed lease is delivered. The owner cannot raise your rent until the paperwork is done.² And when a late renewal offer finally does come, the allowable increase is capped at the Rent Guidelines Board rate in effect on the date the offer should have been made, not the rate in effect when the owner got around to it.⁸

While all of this plays out, you keep every protection you had under your expiring lease as though it were still in effect. You cannot be evicted for holdover simply because the landlord didn’t send renewal paperwork.⁸

If a Late Renewal Offer Arrives

Sometimes the complaint itself shakes a renewal offer loose. If it arrives late, you choose when the new term starts: either the date it would have started had the offer been timely, or the first rent-payment date at least 90 days after the owner actually makes the offer. Either way, the increased rent doesn’t kick in until at least 90 days after the late offer, and the guidelines rate still cannot exceed what was in effect when a timely offer should have been made.⁸

Can the Landlord Retaliate?

Filing with HCR is a legally protected action. Real Property Law Section 223-b prohibits a landlord from serving an eviction notice, refusing to renew, or substantially altering lease terms in retaliation for a good-faith complaint to a government authority about a housing violation. If a landlord brings an eviction case within one year of your complaint, the law presumes retaliation; the burden shifts to the landlord, and the case will be dismissed if the landlord cannot overcome it. A landlord found to have retaliated can be liable for damages, attorney’s fees, and injunctive relief.⁹

Appealing the Rent Administrator’s Order

Either side can challenge the order by filing a Petition for Administrative Review (PAR) on Form RAR-2. The deadline is 35 days from the date the order was issued, not the date you received it, with no extensions. File in person or by mail at Gertz Plaza, 92-31 Union Hall Street, Jamaica, NY 11433, and include a copy of the order plus any supporting documentation. Review is generally limited to the facts and evidence that were already in front of the Rent Administrator, which is why you should submit everything you have at the initial complaint stage rather than hold anything back.¹⁰

1
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Leases (Security Deposits, Roommates, Sublets, and More)
2
Legal Information Institute. New York Codes, Rules and Regulations Title 9 2522.5 – Lease Agreements
3
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Form RA-90 – Failure to Renew Lease or Provide Copy of Signed Lease
4
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Tenant/Owner Forms
5
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. New Procedural Guidance for Office Visits
6
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Form RA-90 ETPA
7
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Tenant Resources
8
Legal Information Institute. New York Codes, Rules and Regulations Title 9 2523.5 – Notice for Renewal of Lease
9
New York State Senate. New York Real Property Law Section 223-B – Retaliation by Landlord Against Tenant
10
New York State Homes and Community Renewal. Fact Sheet – Petition for Administrative Review (PAR)