How S.3799 Will Change Access Agreements for Building Owners & Property Managers
When restoration, façade repairs, or roofing replacements require stepping onto a neighbor’s property, most New York practitioners turn to RPAPL §881, the statute that allows an owner or contractor to obtain temporary access rights if the neighbor refuses.
As previously outlined by Duffy Engineering, until now, §881 has been short, vague, and unpredictable—leading to lengthy negotiations, stalled projects, and costly court petitions. But the recently passed bill S.3799, first introduced in January 2025, and approved by the Governor in December 2025. The bill represents the first substantial modernization of this access process in decades. It takes effect immediately.
As a building envelope consultant regularly navigating access agreements in NYC’s dense built environment, here is what property managers and owners need to know.
S.3799 rewrites and expands RPAPL §881 to:
- Provide clear definitions for key terms.
- Establish a lower burden of proof for obtaining access.
- Define what types of work qualify.
- Establish default license terms that courts must include.
- Discourage unreasonable negotiating behavior through fee-shifting tools.
The goal is simple: speed up access agreements and reduce neighbor-driven project delays. This should also help “Get Sheds Down” faster as the NYC Department of Buildings has been focused on throughout 2025.
Some of the changes you’ll see in the coming months as a result of the new law:
A. “Silence = Refusal”
Under the previous practice, an unresponsive neighbor could stall a project for weeks or months.
Under the amendment, if a neighbor does not respond within a commercially reasonable time that silence is legally treated as a refusal, allowing the owner to petition the court without delay. While a “commercially reasonable” timeframe is not defined, our estimates believe it would be somewhere between 7 – 14 business days.
B. Lower Standard: “Commercially Reasonable” Instead of “Absolutely Necessary”
Historically, courts often required owners to prove that access was absolutely necessary—a difficult threshold.
The revised statute requires only that the work cannot be performed in a commercially reasonable manner without the requested access.
This means the law now recognizes the realities of construction logistics: avoiding a neighbor’s property cannot require absurd cost, unsafe conditions, or impractical means.
C. Broad, Explicit List of Permitted Access Types
The amendment codifies many common elements of façade, roofing, and structural work, including:
- Pre-construction surveys
- Monitoring equipment
- Sidewalk sheds, scaffolds, netting.
- Shoring, bracing, tie-backs, underpinning.
- Temporary airspace use.
- Material/equipment staging.
- Roof access for crane picks or hoist placements.
This eliminates common disputes where neighbors try to argue that scaffolding or roof mobility platforms are “beyond the scope” of §881.
D. Standard Default License Terms Courts Must Include
If the matter reaches court, judges must now include a predictable checklist of terms, including:
- Advance entry notices (with emergency exceptions)
- Construction schedules and updates.
- Sharing drawings, specifications, and insurance certificates.
- Additional insured status for the neighbor.
- Compensation to the adjoining owner.
This consistency should reduce negotiation length and clarify expectations for all parties.
E. Penalties for Bad Faith
Courts may now:
- Consider a party’s history in prior access disputes.
- Require payment of the neighbor’s professional review fees.
- Approve reasonable documents even if a party refuses to sign.
- Award attorneys’ fees for bad-faith conduct.
- This gives courts real tools to curb abusive negotiation tactics.
Given the new wording, access will increasingly rely on a standardized framework—meaning you can expect smoother timelines and fewer “stall tactics.” Since the law emphasizes commercially reasonable requests, owners should expect to submit:
- Clear scopes of work.
- Drawings and details for overhead protection, anchors, and staging.
- Project schedules.
- Insurance information.
Well-prepared submittals reduce disputes and strengthen your position if the matter goes to court.
Neighbor compensation—which has long been inconsistent across projects—will now be a predictable expectation.
The below is what to typically expect in these instances going forward.
- Owner sends a detailed written access request (Scope, drawings, insurance intent, schedule, justification.)
- Neighbor responds:
- Yes
- No
- Negotiation
- Or silence, which now counts as refusal
- Attempt to negotiate a private agreement. Using the statutory checklist as a template.
- If refused or stalled: File an Article 4 special proceeding. Petition must show commercial reasonableness.
- Court issues the license, including:
- Notice procedures
- Schedule/updates
- Document exchange rules
- Additional insured requirements
- Compensation
- Potentially attorney’s fees if bad faith is shown
Most exterior projects in NYC—especially LL11/FISP cycles—cannot be completed without some form of adjacent access. This modernization of §881 is expected to:
- Shorten pre-construction negotiation periods
- Reduce carrying costs caused by delayed permits
- Enhance safety by discouraging “workarounds” when access is denied
- Improve predictability in project scheduling
For building owners of all sizes, this consistency is long overdue.
Kevin M. Duffy
Principal
Duffy Engineering
