Yes, and this is probably the most useful thing to understand about pests in a building. Apartments are not sealed boxes. Wall voids, the spaces around plumbing and conduits, gaps at baseboards and under doors, and shared utility spaces can all provide routes between units.
Why the pattern across a building matters
This is why persistent activity sometimes has to be looked at beyond the apartment where the complaint started, and why the pattern across a building tells a pest professional more than any single apartment can.
What this explains
It also explains a few things residents find confusing:
- Why your apartment can be treated properly and still have activityIf part of the population or the conditions supporting it are somewhere else, treating your apartment alone may address only part of the problem.
- Why the building may want to look at your apartment even though you have not seen anythingMonitoring a few units around a reported one is how a building finds out whether it is dealing with an apartment or a pattern.
- Why openings matter so muchNYC's rules require sealing holes and gaps around pipes and conduits, in cabinets and at baseboards, and fitting door sweeps, as part of correcting a pest condition. Those are the routes.
Why openings are the routes
Correcting a pest condition requires sealing holes, gaps and cracks in walls, floors, baseboards, around pipes and conduits and inside cabinets, and fitting door sweeps that reduce the gap between the door and the floor to no more than a quarter of an inch.
28 RCNY §54-04(a)What you can usefully do
Report what you know, mention any visible openings or leaks in your unit, and say yes if management wants to inspect or place monitors. None of that requires you to know whether the problem is yours.
What to tell your building
I know my neighbor has been dealing with roaches. I have not seen any, but there is an open gap where the pipes go into the wall under my sink. Would you like to inspect or put monitors in my apartment, and can that opening be sealed?
Pest control in an apartment building requires treatment, repairs, access and information working together. See how the pieces fit.
Send this to your building
If other apartments have the same problem, one message to your super or managing agent does more than ten calls about one unit. Copy this and send it however you already talk to them.
Edit it before you send if you want. No sign-up, nothing collected, and we do not see who you send it to.
Where this rule comes from
Sources
- 28 RCNY Chapter 54 — Indoor Allergen Hazards rules, including the §54-04(a) work practices (PDF)
- NYC Administrative Code §27-2017.8 — Integrated pest management practices
- HPD — Indoor Allergen Hazards (Mold, Mice, Roaches and Rats)
We are a pest control company working in Bronx and Brooklyn apartment buildings, and this is general information rather than advice about your apartment or your lease. Where our sources conflict with each other, we say so on the page rather than picking one quietly.