[NY] [NY] If I pay the stipulation for owed rent, can I avoid eviction?

I need to talk to a lawyer about my eviction, or illegal eviction.

Yes.

I’m trying, yes...

No.

My landlord changed the lease by removing my mother from the lease. When the pandemic came, I fell into hard times, but before that, I was paying my rent fine.

So, my mother sought help for rental arrears but was denied because she wasn’t on the lease anymore. I formally complained to my landlord about putting my mother back on the lease and explained I was having economic problems. She said she would put her back once the first debt was paid off—but she never did, even after I paid it off.

Then, it wasn’t about me being unable to pay my rent. I started to withhold rent since she immediately retaliated against me by trying to evict me.

Long story short, after many court dates—with and without an attorney—and a nearly 4-year battle, even showing proof of my landlord’s fraud and discrimination before I ever owed her a dime, I’m still guilty and should be evicted. There are so many other things that went wrong that I haven’t even touched yet.

Yeah, maybe I was a little wrong in withholding rent, but she definitely retaliated. I had an attorney who did a stipulation for about $20,000 that I was supposed to pay back in 2023, but I was depending on government assistance to help me, and unfortunately, I was denied.

And this stipulation is what they’re using against me. But here’s the plot twist—the attorney who represented me actually misrepresented me by not representing me at all. According to a housing court attorney-representative, he was never my attorney and just took my money. He’s now being sued by the state attorney general for defrauding clients like me.

So not only did my landlord commit fraud and discrimination against me, but my attorney did too, and I thought he was on my side.

So, today I owe nearly $50,000. In 2024, I sued my landlord in Supreme Court, and suddenly she was willing to comply—with no stipulation talks. The only reason we didn’t settle was because she refused to drop the eviction case in housing court. When we went to Supreme Court here in the Bronx, I was hit with paperwork errors, so according to her attorney, he would have dropped it with prejudice.

We made a deal to drop it without prejudice so I could re-open the lawsuit later. Apparently, in housing court, it’s “pay or go,” and they don’t seem to handle fraud issues—it’s all about whether you owe rent. Once a tenant owes, the tenant apparently has no rights here in the Bronx.

When I presented my case to the judge on Friday, June 13, 2025, she said the stipulation is valid—even though my ex-attorney was fraudulent—because of “apparent authority.”

My questions are:

If I pay the $20,000 stipulation, can I avoid eviction?

Can the landlord refuse the payment now to get me evicted?

The judge seemed biased, saying, “I can find the evidence,” meaning the same evidence I already submitted and she approved earlier. Can I challenge the judge for “error of law” since she ignored my evidence?

What’s your ultimate advice? I’m worried the marshal could show up any day.

Do you litigate in New York City? There are so many violations from my corrupt landlord, I can’t even count them. My poor mother has been in and out of the hospital because of the stress this landlord caused.