[daepp]

Question for the east coaster and New Yorkers:

My daughter has just finished her first year living in NYC and for the last 5 months has been renting a 3 bedroom apartments with two others in a brand new 4 story apartment building in Brooklyn.

She did not like her first roommate (boyfriend did a lot of drugs) and she did not like the old apartment (everything was worn out or dirty). She was on a sub lease month to month.

She was attracted to the new place, well, because it was new. No one had lived in it before, and they were the first tenants for the entire building. Rent is $3,300 split 3 ways, and they were told (orally only) that utilities would be about $100 per month, which is about what they expected. They have all signed an 18 month lease.

Fast forward to June: ConEd just sent them a bill for $1800+. Seems the landlord was too cheap to install a gas line for a conventional boiler. The heat they had all summer was from 3 mini-splits driven by a heat pump. Further, they were billed monthly about $80 per month, which they did not think was unreasonable since it was a nice, new, insulated building. Well, those were all estimated bills, and no one read the very fine print. Con-Ed finally physically read the bill in early June, and billed them for the difference.

The part that makes no sense to me is that if you take their complete usage, it amounts to $14.75 per day or $430 per month. I'm a born and reared So Cal guy, and I know enough not to try to heat with electrons here. We all use gas for the HVAC and hot water. I know it was a bad winter, and I know radiators are a pain, but can it really cost that much to heat a brand new apartment in Brooklyn? Any suggestions for dealing with what is now a defective building?

Thanks in advance - these are all three recent college grads who are making it on their own. They don't need this!