Tenants at 41-25 Case Street allege dangerous conditions and neglectful management just blocks away from La Mesa Verde, where tenants sued A&E for harassment late last year.
BY COLE SINANIAN
JAMAICA — Dozens of tenants of one of NYC’s most notorious landlords rallied outside a Queens Housing Court Monday morning to demand immediate fixes to their building, whose conditions they say have deteriorated dangerously as a result of management’s neglect.
Tenants at 109-unit 41-25 Case Street in Elmhurst came to housing court to request an order to correct to force landlord A&E Real Estate Holdings to immediately address the building’s 368 open HPD violations and one Department of Buildings (DOB) violation. A&E has earned a reputation for its distressed buildings, with the company’s CEO Margaret Brunn having topped the Public Advocate’s annual “Worst Landlord” list last year.
A&E purchased 41-25 Case Street in December 2013 for $16.7 million. The building is located just a few blocks away from La Mesa Verde, another A&E-owned building where more than 100 tenants sued in December for harassment after the building accrued over 800 HPD violations, many of which were Class C, indicating “immediately hazardous” conditions.
At 41-25 Case St, 21 tenants filed a lawsuit on May 15 with support from Queens Legal Services and Asian Americans for Equality (AAFE).
“It is fair to say that it has gotten worse, because if it was getting better, the tenants wouldn’t feel compelled to start a case in housing court,” said Queens Legal Services Senior Staff Attorney Alex Jacobs in an interview. “If you just try just a little bit, you can make people happy, and it’s just clear that that’s not happening here.”
Flanked by her neighbors and State Assemblymember Jessica Gonzalez Rojas, 41-25 Case Street tenant Amber Gill described the health problems she and her family had suffered as a result of her building’s conditions.
‘I am immuno-compromised, I have a central line, and I became critically ill due to the mold and the infestation in our apartment,” Gill said. “It left me septic in ICU fighting for my life in November. The only thing I received was broken promises from A&E that they would fix it tomorrow. I am here today to tell you that tomorrow never came.”
According to an A&E spokesperson via PR firm Rubenstein Communications, the company has invested over $4.5 million into boiler replacements, electrical upgrades, window replacements and clearing 2,000 maintenance work orders since acquiring the building.
“Ever since acquisition, we have devoted real resources to address issues as quickly and efficiently as possible – and that is what we will continue to do,” the spokesperson wrote in an email. ”As a result of that work, this building, like all those in our portfolio, is in much better shape than it was when we assumed management.”
“Building expenses have increased dramatically while Rent Guidelines Board increases – which are designed to offset increases in building operating costs – have lagged far behind,” the spokesperson continued.
But residents tell a different story.
When Kira Lepley moved into her 2nd floor studio apartment at 41-25 Case St. in 2021, it appeared to have recently been redone. Quickly, though, she began to realize things were not what they seemed. The power would go out when the microwave and dishwasher were both on, and when she’d call the building’s superintendent to fix the problem, he’d rarely respond. When she’d call the A&E maintenance number, she’d either get sent to voicemail or be told to expect an email from management that would never come. Calls and emails to Building Manager Michael Nelson would go mostly unanswered. Back then, Lepley was paying $1400 in rent. Now, she’s paying $2,000 per month, and conditions have only worsened.
The six-storey building’s elevators regularly fail, forcing many of its elderly residents to climb multiple flights of stairs daily. Faulty locks allowed marauding strangers to enter from the streets. In the fall of 2025, the ceiling in the lobby began to collapse, causing sheet rock to fall on tenants’ heads and water to pool on the floor. Lepley and her neighbors began making repeated 311 calls, and filing HPD complaints. A&E did not send a maintenance crew to fix the ceiling until late April, Lepley said — nearly six months later— and just hours before HPD inspectors were scheduled to arrive.
They put some new sheetrock in and painted the ceiling, but according to Lepley, the damage appears structural. Already, she said, it’s starting to collapse again.
“They don’t do anything until the last minute, and even then, they don’t even do the bare minimum,” Lepley said. “They make it look like they’ve done the bare minimum.
It’s her neighbors, though — many of whose apartments are in much worse condition than Lepley’s — that most worry her. She shared photos with the Queens Ledger of crumbling walls, compromised by damage incurred by water and burrowing rats. Two winters ago, the heat was out for 11 days straight, causing temperatures inside to dip so low that a toddler who lived in the building was hospitalized from a sickness incurred by the cold, Lepley said. In May, a notice from ConEdison was posted on the building’s front door, explaining that if A&E did not pay $8,460 to the utility company by June 18th, the tenants would lose their gas.
With the help of AAFE organizers, Lepley and a few dozen of her neighbors organized a tenants association that meets weekly and stays in touch via a WhatsApp group, which now has 54 members. They stay in touch, keeping each other safe and helping neighbors identify packages before they’re stolen due to the building’s lack of adequate security. The tenants association also helped gather support and information for the court case.
In an email sent June 2, the A&E spokesperson told the Queens Ledger that the gas issue had been resolved “as of this morning.”
A&E, one of the city’s largest landlords, operates a $3.9 billion portfolio of 181 buildings throughout Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn and The Bronx. The company was the subject of a $2.1 million settlement with the City announced in January, and has faced financial troubles in recent years as well as numerous lawsuits.
In February 2025, A&E was facing foreclosure proceedings on a $506.3 million J.P. Morgan Chase loan backing a 31-property portfolio.
“A&E deploys the capital of leading US institutions, endowments, pension plans, and family offices, creating value in New York City neighborhoods often ignored by the market while providing quality homes and attractive risk-adjusted returns” the company’s Linkedin bio reads.
“I’ve been looking at their purchase history over the past few years, “ Lepley said of A&E, “and I just want to know: If you are having such a hard time managing buildings, why are you continuing to buy them? Why is your greed the only thing that’s important to you?”
