NYC Premises Liability Lawyer

If you were hurt on someone else's property in New York City, you may have a premises liability claim. That means the property owner, landlord, or business may owe you money for what happened. This city has millions of properties — apartment buildings, bodegas, subway stations, construction sites, parking garages — and the people who own them have a legal duty to keep them safe. When they don't, and you get hurt, the law gives you a path to hold them accountable. Our NYC premises liability lawyers can help

Here's what you need to know right now: in New York, you generally have three years from the date of your injury to file a premises liability lawsuit. But if a city agency owns the property — the MTA, the Parks Department, the Housing Authority — that window can drop to as little as 90 days to file a notice of claim. Miss that deadline and your case is gone. Don't wait to figure out which category your situation falls into. Find out now.

You didn't cause this. A property owner cut corners, ignored a hazard, or failed to fix something they knew was dangerous. Our premises liability lawyers have handled these cases in New York City for decades. You have rights. Let's talk about them.

Can I Sue If I Got Hurt in a NYC Building or on Someone Else's Property?

Yes. New York law requires property owners to maintain their premises in a reasonably safe condition. When they don't, and someone gets hurt, that owner can be held liable for the damages. Landlords, business owners, retailers, building managers, government agencies — all of them.

The key legal concept is notice. A property owner is liable when they knew about the dangerous condition — or should have known about it — and failed to fix it. Courts call this "actual notice" and "constructive notice." Actual notice means someone told them about the problem. Constructive notice means it was there long enough that they should have caught it themselves.

In a city this dense, these cases happen constantly. A cracked sidewalk outside a Queens deli. A broken handrail in a walk-up stairwell on West 181st. A puddle left unaddressed in a Midtown lobby for three hours. A missing light in a parking structure off Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. Every one of those is a potential premises liability case if the property owner had notice and failed to act.

You don't need to understand the legal theory to move forward. What you need to do is document the scene if you can, get medical care immediately, and talk to an NYC personal injury attorney before the trail goes cold.

What If the City of New York Owns the Property Where I Got Hurt?

Ninety days. That's it.

If you were hurt on property owned or maintained by a New York City agency — the MTA, NYCHA, the Parks Department, the Department of Education, the sanitation department — you must file a Notice of Claim within 90 days of your injury. This is a formal legal document. It puts the city on notice that you intend to sue. Miss it and you lose your right to pursue the case. No exceptions.

After you file, the city gets 30 days to investigate before you can start the lawsuit itself. The entire process against a government entity moves differently than a case against a private landlord. Stricter rules. Harder deadlines. Agencies that fight aggressively and have done this thousands of times.

Our NYC premises liability attorneys handle city property cases regularly — NYCHA buildings in the Bronx and Brooklyn, parks from Inwood Hill to Marine Park, MTA stations from 168th Street to Far Rockaway. We know how to file properly, what evidence to preserve, and what these agencies do to defeat claims from people who don't have representation.

That 90-day window does not pause while you recover. Call us.

How Long Do I Have to File a NYC Premises Liability Lawsuit?

Three years from the date of your injury — for most private property cases. Three years sounds like room to breathe. It isn't.

Surveillance footage gets written over in 24 to 72 hours. The property owner quietly repairs the dangerous condition before anyone documents it. Witnesses move, change phone numbers, forget details. The longer you wait, the harder your case becomes to build. Your attorney needs to get to work while the evidence still exists.

And three years isn't even the right number in many situations. Claims against the city or a city agency require a Notice of Claim within 90 days. Wrongful death claims follow different rules. If a minor was injured, the timeline shifts again. There are exceptions that cut both ways, and you won't know which applies to you without talking to someone who handles these cases in New York.

One phone call tells you exactly where you stand.

What If I Was Partly at Fault for Getting Hurt in New York City?

You can still recover money. New York follows pure comparative negligence, which means even if you were partly responsible for what happened, your compensation gets reduced by your share of the fault — not eliminated.

Say a jury finds you were 20% at fault for not paying attention. Your total damages were $100,000. You walk away with $80,000. Not zero.

Insurance adjusters know this rule well and use it aggressively. They'll say you weren't watching where you were going. You'd walked that path before. You were wearing the wrong shoes. These are standard moves, used in case after case, designed to reduce what they owe you. Our premises liability lawyers in New York City have heard every version of this argument. We know how to counter it with the actual evidence.

Don't let the fear of partial fault stop you from making the call.

What If Nobody Witnessed My Accident in New York City?

Your case isn't over because no one saw it happen.

Witness testimony is one form of evidence. In premises liability cases, physical evidence often carries the case on its own — a broken stair that clearly hadn't been touched in months, water stains around a leak showing it wasn't new, a security camera that caught the fall even if no one was standing nearby, maintenance records showing the landlord was notified and did nothing.

Some of that evidence has a very short life. Footage gets overwritten. Property owners make quiet repairs after someone gets hurt, sometimes within hours. That's not a coincidence. That's a property owner knowing they're liable and trying to erase the proof.

We move fast because of exactly that.

Who Might Be Responsible for My Premises Liability Injury in New York City?

More parties than most people realize — and that matters.

A landlord owns the building but a management company handles repairs. A business leases the ground floor but the building owner controls the lobby. A contractor did the work that created the hazard. The city owns the sidewalk in front of a private property. Liability in New York City premises cases is often shared, disputed, and layered across multiple defendants.

That's actually useful for injured people. More potentially liable parties can mean more insurance coverage, more options, and a better path to full recovery. Our NYC premises liability attorneys look at all of them, not just the most obvious target. We find defendants that property owners and insurers would prefer stay out of the picture.

Who Qualifies to File a Premises Liability Claim in New York City?

If you were hurt on property someone else owned, maintained, or controlled, you may have a claim — and you don't have to be a tenant or a paying customer to qualify.

New York law covers invitees, meaning people invited onto a property for business reasons, like a retail customer, a delivery worker, or a contractor. It covers licensees, people allowed on the property socially, like a friend visiting an apartment. In many situations it even covers trespassers, especially children hurt by what courts call an "attractive nuisance" — a hazard that would draw a child in.

You may be eligible if you were hurt in any of these situations:

• Slip and fall on a wet floor or icy sidewalk: Property owners in New York City must address hazardous floor conditions and have reasonable time after a storm to clear snow and ice. When they fail, they're liable.
• Trip and fall on a broken or uneven surface: Cracked sidewalks, broken stairs, uneven flooring, and deteriorating walkways are common in older buildings throughout the five boroughs.
• Injury caused by inadequate lighting: Dark stairwells, unlit hallways, and poorly lit parking structures are building code violations and recognized bases for liability.
• Negligent security: If you were assaulted or robbed on a property where the owner knew crime was a risk and failed to provide adequate security, that's a premises liability claim.
• Elevator or escalator accident: Building owners must maintain elevators and escalators to code. Malfunctions and misleveling injuries happen more often than most people know.
• Building code violation: New York City has detailed safety codes. Violations that directly cause injury create liability.
• Toxic exposure: Mold, asbestos, lead paint — when a landlord or property owner knew about a hazard and failed to address it, that's a claim.

If you're not sure whether what happened to you qualifies, tell us what happened. We'll tell you honestly what you have.

What Types of Premises Liability Cases Do Our New York City Injury Lawyers Handle?

Our premises liability attorneys in New York City handle dangerous property cases across all five boroughs — Manhattan high-rises and Bronx walk-ups, Queens shopping strips and Brooklyn brownstones, Staten Island commercial properties and the full network of city-owned facilities in between.

• Slip and fall accidents: The most common type. Wet floors, icy sidewalks, recently mopped surfaces with no warning sign — these cause serious fractures, head injuries, and back injuries that change people's lives.
• Trip and fall accidents: Raised floor tiles, torn carpeting, broken pavement outside a building entrance, uneven thresholds — anything that catches a foot when someone isn't expecting it.
• Stairway and handrail failures: Missing banisters, broken railings, collapsed stairs. Falls on staircases are among the most severe injury cases we handle.
• Elevator and escalator accidents: Sudden drops, door malfunctions, misleveling between the cab and the floor — these happen in residential buildings, hotels, and commercial towers throughout the city.
• Negligent security cases: Assaults, robberies, and sexual assaults in locations where the property owner failed to maintain reasonable security despite documented crime in the area.
• Toxic exposure cases: Lead paint poisoning, mold illness, and asbestos exposure in residential buildings. Landlords who concealed or ignored known hazards face serious liability.
• Swimming pool accidents: Residential and commercial pool owners must maintain safe conditions. When they don't, drowning and near-drowning cases follow.
• Construction site visitor injuries: People who aren't workers but get hurt near active construction sites in New York City may have claims under several different legal theories.
• NYCHA housing injuries: Falls, structural failures, and toxic exposure in public housing require specific handling with strict government claim procedures.
• Retail and restaurant injuries: Store floors, restaurant kitchens, supermarket aisles — commercial property owners across New York City carry a real duty of care to the people who walk through their doors.

What Compensation Can Premises Liability Victims Recover in New York City?

The goal of a premises liability claim is to put you back — financially, as much as possible — where you were before you got hurt.

Economic damages cover the losses you can document. Every medical bill from the emergency room forward — hospitalizations, surgery, physical therapy, follow-up appointments, prescriptions, medical equipment. Lost wages from the time you've already missed at work. If this injury affects what you can do going forward — if you can't return to your trade, or you've had to move to lighter, lower-paying work — that lost earning capacity is part of your claim too. So are transportation costs, home modifications, and in-home care if your injuries require it.

Non-economic damages don't come with receipts but they're just as real. Pain and suffering. The anxiety that follows a serious fall, the sleeplessness, the loss of things you used to do without thinking. The effect your injuries have had on your marriage or your relationship with your kids. Courts in New York City account for these losses, and juries here understand what it means when someone's quality of life gets taken from them by someone else's negligence.

In cases involving reckless conduct — a landlord who got written complaints about a broken stair for two years and did nothing until someone fell — punitive damages may be available. These aren't available in every case. But when the facts support them, they can significantly change the outcome.

Our premises liability lawyers in New York City assess all of this during your consultation, based on your specific injuries, your documentation, and how this has actually affected your life.

How Our NYC Premises Liability Attorneys Can Help You

The property owner already has an attorney. Their insurance company has adjusters and defense lawyers who handle these cases every single day. Their entire job is to reduce what they pay you, or pay you nothing at all. They have the system memorized.

You shouldn't be walking into that alone.

Our premises liability lawyers in New York City investigate before evidence disappears. We get to the scene. We pull maintenance records. We track down surveillance footage before it gets overwritten. We retain engineers or safety consultants when the defect needs technical documentation. We identify every potentially liable party — the management company the landlord wants you to forget about, the contractor whose work created the hazard, the city agency that owns the sidewalk in front of the building.

• Immediate investigation: We move fast because evidence in New York City has a short shelf life. The scene changes. Footage disappears. We get there first.
• Notice of Claim filing: If a government entity is involved, we file before the 90-day window closes. This is not optional and it cannot be undone if missed.
• Complete damage documentation: Medical records, lost wage verification, expert testimony on future treatment costs and life impact. We build the full picture.
• Negotiation with real leverage: We know what New York City juries award for these injuries. We don't accept the first offer. We don't accept the second one either, usually.
• Trial-ready from day one: If the case doesn't settle at a number that reflects what you actually lost, we take it to trial. Insurers know we do. That changes how they negotiate.
• No upfront cost to you: Our premises liability lawyers in New York City work on contingency. You pay nothing unless we recover money for you.

Call Kelner & Kelner — NYC Premises Liability Lawyers

You got hurt on someone else's property. Someone knew there was a problem and didn't fix it. Now you're dealing with medical bills, missed work, and pain that may not go away anytime soon. Kelner & Kelner has represented injured New Yorkers for decades and we know exactly what these cases require. Call us today. The consultation is free, and the sooner we start, the more we have to work with.