New York governor Andrew Cuomo’s office on Monday unveiled an investigation into claims the family-run firm of Donald Trump’s son-in-law and White House adviser Jared Kushner tried to harass tenants out of an apartment building in a fashionable section of Brooklyn.

The decision follows an Associated Press report published on Sunday in which more than a dozen current and former tenants of Austin Nichols House in Williamsburg claimed they were subjected to relentless construction noise, toxic dust and an infestation of rodents, combined with steep rent hikes, as part of an effort to force them out so they could be replaced with higher-paying tenants.

“Governor Cuomo has zero tolerance for tenant abuse of any kind and we will aggressively take on landlords who try to intimidate people out of their homes,” said RuthAnne Visnauskas, commissioner of New York State Homes and Community Renewal, in a statement.

“In New York, no one is above the law, and we will thoroughly investigate the appalling allegations of harassment at this or any related property.”

Over the past three years, the AP report claimed, more than 250 rent-stabilized apartments, or three-quarters of tenants of the building – were either emptied or sold, bringing in around $155m to Kushner Companies.

“They won, they succeeded,” said Barth Bazyluk, who left apartment C606 with his family last year. “You have to be ignorant or dumb to think this wasn’t deliberate.”

Aaron Carr, head of Housing Rights Initiative, a tenant’s rights watchdog that filed a $10m lawsuit late on Sunday claiming that some tenants were also exposed to high levels of cancer-causing dust, said the conditions and tenant exodus “provides a window into the Kushner Companies′ predatory business model”.

Kushner and two partners paid $275m for the building in April 2015. The company has denied harassing tenants to get them out, and said it will defend itself vigorously.

“The residents of Austin Nichols House were fully informed about the planned renovation and all work was completed under the full supervision by the New York City Department of Buildings and other regulatory agencies, with full permits and with no violations for these claims,” the company said in a statement.

The latest lawsuit adds to Kushner Companies’ extensive list of financial and legal woes. The company is faced with finding $1.2bn to refinance its flagship New York property at 666 Fifth Avenue. It has also been forced to defend itself against reports that it has taken out loans totaling $509m from lenders with whom Kushner has held White House meetings.

In addition, the Securities and Exchange Commission is reportedly looking into the company’s promotion of White House ties to pitch EB-5, a congressionally approved visa-for-investment system, to Chinese investors.

Nor are tenants in the Williamsburg development the first to claim that Kushner Companies has attempted to push them out by creating unlivable conditions.

In March, a New York City council member, Ritchie Torres, and a tenant’s rights group, Housing Rights Initiative (HRI), said they would launch an investigation of Kushner Companies following accusations it routinely filed false paperwork with New York City, declaring it had no rent-regulated tenants in buildings it owned.

HRI claimed that the company had entered at least 80 false applications for building permits in 34 buildings across New York City from 2013 to 2016 claiming they had no rent-regulated tenants. But tax documents showed there were more than 300 such units.

The strategy, tenants claimed, allowed the company to start renovations designed to drive them out.