A fire at a Highbridge building last week left windows shattered, walls and ceilings destroyed and five families sleeping in hotels. But residents say they’ve had issues with maintenance for years, and city data shows the building and its management company have a history of code violations— many that impact fire safety.
The fire started around 10:30 a.m. on Aug. 9, when neighbors say that a dryer caught fire on the ground floor in the corner of the building that faces Nelson Avenue and borders Corporal Irwin Fischer Park. Tenants in the floors directly above the laundry room evacuated and watched nearby from the park as clouds of black smoke poured from the building and FDNY firefighters filed inside and up the stairs.
Bronx *ALL HANDS* Box 2720
1314 Nelson Ave off W 170 St
FIRE TOP FLOOR 6 STORY L SHAPED 200X150 #FDNY pic.twitter.com/BfAmCGugzd— NYCFireWire (@NYCFireWire) September 9, 2025
Fire officials said that they were still investigating and had not yet determined the cause of the fire, but a partial vacate order for the building filed with the Department of Buildings (DOB) identified the laundry room as an area with fire and smoke damage. A resident who asked that their name be withheld to avoid retaliation told the Bronx Times that her family stopped using the laundry in the building a few months ago because the machines were so unpredictable.
“ I remember recently I washed my clothes and there’s holes in my clothes and there’s some sticky things that just stuck my clothes together completely,” she said. “I cannot get it out. I had to throw them out.”
She said she hears her neighbors complaining about the laundry “so much.”
But avoiding the building’s laundry machines didn’t help her family avoid the broken windows, smashed drywall, and a giant hole in the ceiling caused by firefighters dousing the flames.
“ Everything is just like totally messed up,” she said. “Like the walls are coming down, [water] dripping down. There’s water on the floor all over. Even the bedroom was like completely wet.”
Building’s notorious history
Without an official cause from FDNY fire investigators, it’s difficult to directly connect residents’ complaints and personal accounts about the laundry room to the Aug. 9 fire. But HPD records revealed that at the time of the fire, 1314 Nelson Ave. had over 250 open code violations with Housing Preservation and Development (HPD), the city’s top housing agency.
The Nelson Avenue building is owned by Peter Fine, a prolific Bronx landlord notorious for high eviction rates, neglected buildings, and currying favor with politicians. Fine, and his management company, Wavecrest Management, owns and manages dozens of buildings in the Bronx .
In the months ahead of the fire, HPD issued dozens of new violations, including violations for missing or defective smoke detectors and self-closing doors— a violation which was blamed for worsening the death toll of the Twin Parks fire in 2022.
It would be impossible for HPD to have an inspector physically verify each correction of the housing code violation, so landlords are able to self-certify that they’ve made the mandated repairs
In the case of 1314 Nelson Ave., all of the violations for smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and self-closing doors were supposed to be corrected before Aug. 9, the date of the fire. Records show that the landlord self-certified that the repairs were made.
But landlords aren’t required to certify repairs for days or sometimes weeks after repairs are made. Six fire safety repairs at Nelson Avenue were certified on Sept. 15, six days after the fire.
But, Peter Fine and Wavecrest Management are notorious for something else in Bronx real estate: falsely certifying repairs.
Three of Fine’s other buildings in the Bronx — 270 East Burnside Ave., 951 Hoe Ave., and 31 West Tremont Ave. — made HPD’s first Certification Watchlist, which identifies the buildings in the city where landlords have lied the most about repairing code violations.
Multiple residents reported malfunctioning smoke detectors to the Bronx Times.
HPD’s First Deputy Press Secretary, Natasha Kersey, told the Bronx Times that the agency is committed to ensuring that New Yorkers’ homes are safe and affordable and that landlords who act in bad faith are held accountable.
“In this case, when New Yorkers have experienced something as horrific as a fire that forces them out of their home, HPD, our partner agencies, and the American Red Cross work diligently to help,” Kersey said in a statement.” In the short-term, we have been focused on making sure that affected tenants have a safe place to stay, and in the long-term, we will be working to ensure that repairs are made and properly certified.”
HPD currently has 10 open lawsuits against Fine in Bronx housing court, including one for falsely certifying repairs at 951 Hoe Avenue.
Multiple phone calls and a message requesting comment to Fine’s management company, Wavecrest Management, went unanswered.
‘You call management … they don’t respond back.’
Tenants at Fine’s building on Nelson Avenue said they were tired of living in substandard conditions. Many complained that the neglect was compounded by poor security, which allowed people to access the building who didn’t live there.
One older tenant who described themselves as a “long-time resident” told the Bronx Times that she has seen the building go from a beautiful and nice place to live, to something sad.
“ Our doors are broken,” she said. “People are living on the staircases in here— smoking crack, smoking this, doing that, having sex, it’s so much going on. I can’t even begin to tell you how disappointed I am in this building.”
But she said that she doesn’t blame the current superintendent, who she says has no help to maintain the 115 units in the building.
“ That man can’t do all this by himself, and they refuse to put anybody here to help him,” she said.
She said she tries not to get too upset over things that she can’t control.
“ What else is there you can do?” she said. “You call management for them to help you with certain things. They don’t respond back.”
