Landlords Go Smoke-Free and Save Money and Time

Adopt A Smokefree Housing Policy

• Smoke drifting from lit tobacco products and/or exhaled by smokers seeps into the living spaces of other tenants and common areas of residential buildings. Secondhand smoke (SHS) travels through lighting fixtures, cracks in walls, around plumbing, under doors and shared heating/ventilation.
• Smokefree Policy: Leases that prohibit carrying or using lit tobacco products in both public and private areas of multi-unit housing are legal ways for landlords and management companies to protect property and tenants from the damage caused by secondhand smoke.*1

Save Money

• Avoid the excess building maintenance costs caused by smoking:
• Extensive cleaning when smokers vacate a residence.
• Increased repainting.
• More frequent rug and window treatment cleaning and replacement.
  Repair or replacement of floors and countertops burned by cigarettes.

Protect Property and Lives

• Cigarettes are a leading cause of residential building fires.1
  Cigarette-caused fires are the #1 reason for fire death in the US.2
  In New York, cigarette-caused fires kill 5 times more people than fires from other causes.3
• Discounts on fire, life and property insurance are offered by some companies to smokefree buildings.4

Invest in the Demand

• In New York, 74% of non-smokers favor no-smoking policies where they live.5
  
• Many renters view smokefree housing as a desirable amenity.
  50% of NYC renters expressed a willingness to pay more to live in a smokefree building (2005 survey).

Smokefree policies help tomaintain property values:

• Apartments that smell of secondhand smoke are harder to rent.
• Promote your smokefree property to realtors, consumers and in newspaper ads.

For the Health of it

• More than a nuisance or bad smell: Secondhand smoke is class ‘A’ carcinogen, like radon and asbestos, with more than 4,000 toxic chemicals that seep from unit to unit.
• Among the many illnesses caused or made worse by SHS are: lung cancer, asthma, sinus infections, ear infections, chronic cough, sudden infant death syndrome and heart disease.

Liability Protection

• Public tolerance for exposure to SHS at home appears to be rapidly decreasing as the hazards become known.
• An increasing number of secondhand smoke and housing cases are being heard in the courts.
• Tenants with pre-existing physical conditions aggravated by SHS may file complaints under the FHA (Fair Housing Act).
  
• Landlords, management companies, condo associations, coop owners and smokers are vulnerable to nuisance suits, warrant of habitability suits, quiet enjoyment suits and FHA complaints.
• Adopting smokefree building policies are legal and a way to avoid possible future secondhand smoke law suits.

 

RECENT NYC CASE: In 2006 (Poyck v. Bryant), a NYC judge ruled that tenants who broke a lease because of secondhand smoke exposure were not liable for $12,000 in back rent. The landlord’s failure to take action to protect the tenants from SHS was considered a ‘breach of warrant of habitability,’ guaranteed in every lease.

*indicates a definition or exception

 

This information has been developed by and graciously provided by www.smokefreehousingny.com, a NY State Tobacco Free Partner