The unit is already sold. You still have a claim.

NY LIEN LAW § 182

First, get the facility's file.

Everything depends on what the facility did and when, and the facility has the records. Your first written request, sent immediately, should ask for: the rental agreement and every amendment; the account history showing each charge and payment with dates; every notice the facility claims to have sent, with proof of mailing or transmission and the address used; the advertisement with proof of publication; the sale record showing date, method, buyer, and price; and the accounting of proceeds against the claim. A facility that complied will produce this readily. A facility that did not will stall, and the stall is itself telling.

In parallel, preserve your own records: the rental agreement you signed, your payment history, every email or text with the facility, any address change you sent, and your access history if the facility's app or gate log shows it.

The statutory procedure the facility was supposed to follow is laid out step by step on our hub, storage unit lien sales in New York. Read it with the facility's file beside you.

The surplus is yours regardless.

Even when a sale was fully compliant, the facility is entitled to keep only its lawful claim (rent and charges authorized by the rental agreement) plus reasonable expenses of the sale. Anything above that is surplus, and under Lien Law § 182 it belongs to the occupant. The facility must account for it and pay it over on demand.

Two things to check. First, the claim itself: lien fees, "auction fees," late charges, and administrative charges are recoverable only if the rental agreement authorizes them, and many do not, or cap them. Fees the agreement does not support inflate the claim and shrink the surplus, and you can recover the difference. Second, the sale price: if the facility's own employees or an affiliate bought the unit for a nominal sum, the commercial reasonableness of the sale is in question, and the facility may be accountable for a fair value rather than the price it chose to accept.

Finding the notice and advertising defects.

The statute's protection lives in the details, and this is where most post-sale claims are won. Compare the facility's file against the statutory steps:

• Method of delivery. Was the notice sent by a method the statute permits (historically verified or certified mail; email only where the statute and your agreement allowed it)? A notice by regular mail, a phone call, a sticker on the unit, or a text is not statutory notice.
• Address. Was it sent to your last known address as the facility had it? If you updated your address and the facility used the old one, the notice failed.
• Content. Did the notice include an itemized statement of the claim with dates, a demand for payment within a stated period, a statement that the property would be advertised and sold, and a description sufficient to identify the unit or property? Missing any element is a defect.
• Cure period. Was the deadline at least the statutory minimum? A notice giving fewer days than the statute requires is defective even if you never would have paid.
• Advertising. Was the sale advertised as the statute requires, the required number of times, in a qualifying publication or website, with the required content, and before the sale date? Facilities that sell through online auction platforms sometimes treat the platform listing as the advertisement; whether it qualifies depends on the statute's current terms and is worth scrutinizing.
• Sale. Was the sale held at the advertised time and place, and was it conducted in a commercially reasonable way?

A sale on a defective notice or without proper advertising is not authorized by the statute. The facility's lien gave it a right to sell only on compliance; without compliance, it disposed of your property without legal right, which is conversion.

Putting a value on what is gone.

Conversion damages are the fair market value of the property at the time of the sale, not replacement cost and not sentimental value. Proving that for a unit you no longer have access to is the hard part, and it is done by reconstruction:

• Inventory. Write a room-by-room or box-by-box list from memory, then refine it. Moving company inventories, insurance schedules, and the facility's own advertisement describing the contents are strong corroboration.
• Photographs. Anything on your phone showing the items before storage or in the unit.
• Receipts and records. Purchase receipts, credit card statements, appraisals for anything valuable.
• Comparable prices. Used-market listings for the same items in the same condition at the sale date.
• The auction record. What the buyer paid is evidence of value, but a depressed auction price at a defectively noticed sale is not the ceiling; courts look at fair market value, and your evidence of it counts.

Irreplaceable items such as family documents, photographs, and heirlooms have limited market value under the conversion measure but may support additional damages on other theories, and they matter to how a facility's insurer views the claim. List them.

A worked example.

A Staten Island tenant falls two months behind, $420, while dealing with a hospitalization. The facility sends a notice by regular mail with a balance and a line stating "pay within 10 days or unit will be sold," no itemization, no sale date. It lists the unit on an online auction site with a two-word description and sells it eleven days later for $275. No newspaper or website advertisement beyond the auction listing. The tenant's unit held a bedroom set, a road bike, kitchenware, and her late mother's photo albums. Her reconstructed inventory, with receipts for the bike and the furniture, comes to $5,800 at used-market value.

The notice was defective on method and content, the cure period was likely shorter than the statutory minimum, and the advertising is questionable. The facility's rent claim of $420 may not be available as an offset against conversion damages where its own non-compliance voided the sale. The claim is $5,800 plus the separate argument over the albums. Well within small claims in New York City, and a letter that lays it out step by step typically gets the facility's regional office or insurer on the phone.

What a demand letter does here.

Our post-sale storage letters are built in three sections. The first reconstructs the timeline from the facility's file and yours, and identifies each departure from Lien Law § 182's procedure, in plain terms. The second sets out the valuation with the inventory and supporting documents attached, and separately demands the surplus accounting and return of any unauthorized fees. The third demands payment by a date and states the alternative: a conversion action in which the facility's rent claim is no offset. The letter goes to the facility, its corporate parent or management company where we can identify one, and invites referral to their insurer.

We are direct about limits. If the facility complied with the statute, your claim is the surplus and nothing more, and a letter to collect a small surplus may not be worth the fee. If the contents were worth a few hundred dollars, small claims on your own is more proportionate than a letter, and we will point you to our New York small claims court guide instead. See how our flat-fee demand letters work.

Filing if the letter is ignored.

Conversion claims up to the small claims limit, which is $10,000 in New York City courts, can be filed without a lawyer. Outside the city the limits are lower and vary by court. The facility's file, your inventory, and the demand letter are the exhibits. The comparison of paths is on demand letter vs. small claims. For larger claims, a civil court or Supreme Court action is the route, and an attorney becomes important. Where a facility's practice looks systematic, a complaint to the Attorney General's consumer bureau is worth filing alongside. For the general law of demand, refusal, and conversion outside the storage context, see an ex won't return my belongings.