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<blockquote>So the law is that the same family can't pay rent for two apartments in the same building? What is this law preventing? Maybe i am missing a piece of the puzzle here. (?) </blockquote> There have been instances where apartments in NYC (and probably other cities) have been illegaly subdivided and there is no record with the fire department of changes made to the apartment. Some of these apartments become overcrowded with tenants (though this didn't appear to be the case here), overcrowded tenants overload electrical circuits, and the potential for a fire becomes very real. When firefighters are en route to a building on fire, they pull up a database that tells them the type of construction of the building. They frequently inspect buildings in their district to the best of their ability but usually cannot get into every apartment to check for illegal and unsafe alterations. When they arrive at a building on fire and get into the trouble area, they are presented with a situation where there are rooms where there shouldn't be and walls blocking exits and it presents more problems and puts more people in danger. This video was done in 2005. In January 2005 there was a case in the Bronx where two or three firefighters were killed when they had to jump out of windows of an illegally subdivided apartment, after they became trapped due to the illegal construction (Google: Curtis Meyran for more info if you're interested). Afterwards NYC started to crack down on illegal alterations to apartments, and I guess enforce a rule where they can evict people who change the layouts of buildings without permits. I'm not defending the practice, I'm just pointing out an angle that most of you aren't aware of.

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