Rep. Charles Rangel today defended living in three combined, rent-stabilized Harlem apartments as a legal benefit of long-term city residency, but said he may abandon a fourth apartment he uses for campaign work if it’s not allowed.

Mr. Rangel, one of New York’s most influential politicians and the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, held a raucous news conference outside his Lenox Terrace apartment complex to respond to The New York Times’ report today on his four below-market apartments.

“I feel so terribly proud of never having to leave my neighborhood,” said Mr. Rangel, 78, who said he had lived in two homes in Harlem throughout his life. He said he didn’t negotiate a deal with his landlord for his current apartment, where he has lived for about 20 years.

“I don’t see anything unfair about it, and I didn’t even know it was a deal,” said Mr. Rangel.

Housing experts said Mr. Rangel’s living arrangement was legal and said tenants often combine smaller, rent-stabilized apartments into larger ones over the years. Governor Paterson acknowledged earlier this year paying below-market rent in an apartment in Mr. Rangel’s building.

But some questioned whether the powerful congressman and champion of affordable housing initiatives was taking advantage in a market where low-income housing is disappearing.

“It’s that he seems to have gotten away with certain things with his landlord, which is notorious for unfairly targeting other rent-stabilized tenants for eviction,” an organizer for the Metropolitan Housing Council, a tenants’ rights group, Joe Catron, said.

Mr. Rangel pays a combined $3,894 a month for the four apartments, the Times reported. The rent is roughly half the market rates advertised by his landlord, The Olnick Organization. He earns $162,500 a year, has a time share in the Dominican Republic and a net worth of between $516,000 and $1.3 million, according to congressional financial disclosure records.

An Olnick spokeswoman Jeannette Boccini declined comment today on Mr. Rangel’s living situation.

Regulations governing the city’s 1 million rent-stabilized apartments allow a tenant to live in an apartment at below-market rates as long as it’s a primary residence — the tenant’s home for just over six months of the year.

Tenants’ rent rises every one or two years, with the increase set by a city board. Long-term residents sometimes pay far lower rents than newer arrivals, since owners can impose higher rents on apartments when they change hands.

Combining apartments to make a larger one is “not uncommon,” a spokeswoman for the state Division of Housing and Community Renewal, Nancy Peters, said. The state Division of Housing and Community Renewal oversees regulations for rent-stabilized apartments.

Mr. Rangel said he moved into an apartment that had already been combined by a previous tenant. The congressman said he added another studio apartment a few years later to accommodate visiting relatives.

The regulations do not allow rent-stabilized apartments to be used for business. The rules usually are enforced at the landlord’s discretion, Ms. Peters said.

Mr. Rangel said in a separate statement that he rented the fourth apartment, six floors below his home, about a decade ago and thought it was appropriate to use as an office because there are other offices in the complex.

“I guess I have to take another look at something that hasn’t come up until now,” Mr. Rangel said of the office. He said he would talk to his landlord and would move his campaign office if necessary.

An owner of the Olnick Organization, Sylvia Olnick, donated $2,000 to Mr. Rangel’s campaign in 2004 and has given $5,000 since 2004 to his political action committee. Olnick’s president, Bruce Simon, donated $500 to Mr. Rangel’s PAC, according to the Federal Election Commission.

Mr. Rangel said he didn’t know of the donations until he read about them in the Times.

Some tenants openly challenged Mr. Rangel as he spoke today, including a critic who said the congressman didn’t help him when he was facing eviction from another apartment building owned by the same landlord.

“He’s got a reputation of not helping anyone other than himself,” said Lance Smith, 45, who has a Web site critical of Mr. Rangel.

Mr. Catron said Olnick has targeted residents legally living in Lenox Terrace for eviction, sometimes citing false records of home ownership elsewhere.

A film producer who lives in an Olnick building next to Mr. Rangel’s, Hanif I. Shabazz, said the congressman helped alleviate a rat problem in his building and responded to other tenants’ complaints. Mr. Shabazz, a 30-year resident of a rent-stabilized apartment, said he had no problem with Mr. Rangel’s similar arrangement.

“We know Charlie,” said Mr. Shabazz. “We love him.”