Justia Real Estate & Property Law Opinion Summaries

Defendant owned real property located at 3546 Multiview Drive in Los Angeles, California (the property). That year, he executed two deeds of trust against the property. Defendant obtained a HELOC from National City Bank, memorialized in an Equity Reserve Agreement and secured by a deed of trust against the property (collectively, the HELOC agreement). Piedmont Capital, L.L.C. (Piedmont)—a debt buyer—purchased the HELOC debt. Piedmont sued Defendant. Following a demurrer to the original complaint sustained with leave to amend, Piedmont filed the operative first amended complaint for (1) breach of contract, (2) money lent, (3) money had and received, and (4) declaratory relief. Although Piedmont alleged that the full amount of the HELOC debt Defendant owed totaled $186,587.26, Piedmont conceded that it was “not seeking to collect on any [amounts] that were already barred by the applicable statute of limitations at the time [the] action was filed.”   The Second Appellate District reversed. At issue is whether the borrower’s duty to make a monthly payment under such a HELOC agreement indivisible from the borrower’s duty to pay the full amount such that the statute of limitations to recover the full amount begins to run upon the first missed monthly payment. The court held that the duties are divisible. The court explained that the HELOC agreement in this case—by setting a fixed maturity date for the full amount and leaving it to the discretion of the lender whether to accelerate that date—necessarily contemplates that a breach as to a monthly payment does not constitute a breach as to the full amount. View "Piedmont Capital Management, L.L.C. v. McElfish" on Justia Law

The County of San Luis Obispo granted a permit to move an easement on a property in the coastal zone. However, the California Coastal Commission denied the permit. The trial court found in the Commission's favor.The County appealed under the California Coastal Act of 1976( Coastal Act). The CoastalAct establishes a “coastal zone,” defined by an official map and generally extending from the mean high tide line landward 1000 yards. Every city or county with jurisdiction over lands within the coastal zone is required to create a “local coastal program” to implement the provisions and policies of the Coastal Act.The Commission has de novo review authority over the County’s grant of the permit. Here, because the Commission denied the McCarthys’ permit on appeal, the development was not authorized pursuant to the Coastal Act. Thus the Second Appellate District affirmed the trial court's order. View "Cave Landing, LLC v. Cal. Coastal Com." on Justia Law

The Westin St. Francis, in Union Square, is San Francisco’s third largest hotel. In return for a base management fee and an incentive fee, the Company manages and maintains the hotel, handles personnel and employment matters, provides advertising and promotional services, and provides all computer services, including reservations. In addition to renting its rooms, the Westin receives income from guest cancellations, no-shows, and attrition. The hotel also profits from in-room movies and guest laundry services provided by third parties. In 2015, BRE purchased Strategic, the owner of the Westin St. Francis and other hotels, triggering a reassessment. The Assessor assessed the hotel’s value at approximately $785 million. Strategic sought a refund. The trial court upheld the Board’s determination.The court of appeal held that the method used by the city to exclude the value of nontaxable, intangible assets from the assessed value of the hotel—i.e., the deduction of fees or expenses associated with the asset from the hotel’s future income stream—is legally incorrect. As a result, the assessed value of the hotel improperly subsumed the value of the management agreement, in-room movies, and guest laundry services. However, the assessed value properly included the cancellation/no-show/attrition income because that asset is a taxable attribute of the property. The court remanded for a redetermination of the taxable value of the hotel. View "SHR St. Francis, LLC v. City and County of San Francisco" on Justia Law

The LLC, managed by Kountze, owns the four-unit building. Kountze lives in one unit. When the LLC acquired the property in 2017, the tenants lived in unit 3. In 2020, the LLC served them with a “Notice of Termination of Tenancy” (NOT), stating that the landlord was withdrawing the property from the residential rental market under the Ellis Act and the San Francisco Residential Rent Stabilization and Arbitration Ordinance. The landlord also filed with the Residential Rent Stabilization and Arbitration Board a “Notice of Intent to Withdraw Residential Units from the Rental Market.” Counsel for the landlord testified that she sent the NOT to the tenants’ address with checks for $3,492.62 relocation payments. The postal service returned them due to the overflow of mail in the tenants’ mailboxes. The landlord and tenants had been engaged in protracted litigation, so counsel sent the NOT and checks to their counsel, who responded that he was “not authorized to accept” the payments.The landlord filed this unlawful detainer action. The tenants asserted affirmative defenses relating to the landlord’s lack of intent to withdraw the unit from the market and non-compliance with the Ellis Act. The court of appeal affirmed summary judgment against the tenants, sustaining relevance objections to the tenants’ evidence. The tenants failed to raise a triable issue of material fact as to compliance with the Ellis Act and Rent Ordinance. View "640 Octavia LLC v. Pieper" on Justia Law

The City of Los Angeles (the City) approved a project at 1719-1731 North Whitley Avenue in Hollywood (the Project) that would replace 40 apartments subject to the City’s rent stabilization ordinance (RSO) with a hotel. The City determined the Project was exempt from review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines relating to certain development projects. The relevant guideline addresses what is often referred to as the “infill” exemption or the “Class 32” exemption. Respondent United Neighborhoods for Los Angeles (United Neighborhoods) sought a writ of mandate in the Los Angeles Superior Court, arguing, among other things, that the in-fill exemption does not apply because the Project is not consistent with a General Plan policy concerning the preservation of affordable housing. The trial court granted the writ, effectively halting the Project until the City was to find the Project is consistent with that policy or 148-159 undertakes CEQA review. The City and real parties in interest appeal.   The Second Appellate District affirmed the order granting the petition for writ of mandate. The court explained that the City’s suggestion that the Project’s consistency with the Framework Element implies consistency “with the entirety of the General Plan” because of the Framework Element’s foundational role assumes, contrary to authority, the Framework Element stands in perfect harmony with the General Plan. However, the court explained that although it affirms the trial court, it does not suggest that the City was necessarily required to make formal findings that Housing Element policies are outweighed by competing policies favoring the Project. View "United Neighborhoods for L.A. v. City of L.A." on Justia Law

The 186-acre Bollinger Valley, in rural Moraga near St. Mary’s College, is sloped; about half of the proposed project site has grades over 20 percent, and “significant portions” have grades over 35 percent. The property is used for cattle grazing and a summer equestrian day camp. Bruzzone purchased an interest in the property in 1967. Before Moraga was incorporated as a city in 1974, the property's Contra Costa County zoning designation “allowed residential development with a density of approximately three dwelling units per acre.”In 1979, Moraga adopted its first general plan. The property was denominated “Public Open Space – Study.” Permitted uses were “[a]griculture and accessory buildings thereto.” Although originally meant to be temporary, the Study designation has remained in place. For several reasons, including safety and environmental concerns, Moraga denied applications to develop housing on the property.The trial court directed Moraga to give the property a legally compliant land-use designation but otherwise rejected Bruzzones’ claims. The court of appeal affirmed. The Study designation is legally invalid under Government Code 65302, but the lack of a legally compliant land-use designation alone did not preclude Moraga from denying the project application for unrelated reasons, none of which the Bruzzones challenge. The court also upheld the rejection of claims of inverse condemnation and equal protection and due process violations. View "Lafayette Bollinger Development v. Town of Moraga" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Olen Properties Corp. owned commercial property in the City of Newport Beach (the City) within an area known as the Koll Center. The Koll Center was a mixed-use development area, near the John Wayne Airport, San Joaquin Freshwater Marsh Reserve, and the University of California, Irvine. It was located within the “Airport Area,” a portion of the City adjacent to John Wayne Airport, governed by the City’s Airport Business Area Integrated Conceptual Development Plan. In 2020 and 2021, the City considered and approved the request of Real Party in Interest TPG (KCN) Acquisition, LLC (TPG) to develop a five-story, 312-unit residential housing project (the Project) on an existing surface parking lot serving the Koll Center’s existing commercial tenants. In an effort to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the City obtained an addendum (the Addendum) to an existing environmental impact report prepared in 2006 (the 2006 EIR) as part of its general plan update. The Addendum considered a wide range of possible environmental impacts but concluded the Project’s impacts “would either be the same or not substantially greater than those described by the [2006 EIR].” Plaintiff opposed approval of the Project before the City. Among other things, plaintiff argued the City could not rely upon an addendum to the 2006 EIR and was legally required to obtain a subsequent EIR. After the City’s approval of the Project, plaintiff filed suit, seeking a writ of mandate compelling the City to void its approval for violation of CEQA, and for injunctive relief, barring construction at the site. The trial court explained its denial in an extensive written ruling, addressing and rejecting each of plaintiff's arguments. The Court of Appeal concurred with the trial court's judgment and affirmed. View "Olen Properties Corp. v. City of Newport Beach" on Justia Law

Ocie Payne Hinkle (Ocie)2 was an 89-year-old woman who owned several parcels of property in Los Angeles, California. Ocie has an adult son, Ocy. A few years earlier, Ocie had started a relationship with Roi Wilson (Wilson). Ocie was hospitalized and medicated; while in that state, Wilson prevailed upon Ocie to grant him power of attorney over her affairs. Wilson then used that power of attorney to deed away much of Ocie’s real property. As pertinent to this case, while acting as Ocie’s “attorney-in-fact,” Wilson signed a grant deed giving Ocie’s property at 1723 Buckingham Road (the Buckingham property or the property) to Edmound Daire (Daire) (the October 2010 grant deed). Daire applied to Ridec LLC (Ridec) for a $650,000 loan and offered up the Buckingham property as collateral. Ridec retained a title insurer. Ridec’s title insurer sued Daire and Citibank, seeking—and obtaining—court orders freezing the disbursed loan funds still in Daire’s Citibank account. Ridec joined that lawsuit via a cross-complaint against Daire, Ocy, and PSG, in which it sought to establish the validity of its deed of trust. Ridec challenged the trial court’s ruling declaring its deed of trust invalid.   The Second Appellate District reversed and remanded with directions to enter a judgment finding that Ridec’s deed of trust is valid. Ridec’s appeal from the posttrial order denying its motion to set aside the judgment is, therefore, moot. The court explained that because none of the trial court’s reasons for disregarding section 764.060 and Tsasu are valid, the court erred in refusing to apply the governing statute and binding precedent interpreting that statute. View "Ridec LLC v. Hinkle" on Justia Law

Part of Visitacion’s land in San Francisco’s Visitacion Valley was formerly owned by Southern Pacific, which was, at the time of conveyance (1990), conducting railroad-related business on part of the property. The land subject to an easement is bounded by the right-of-way for mainline railroad tracks. At some point, railroad activities on the dominant tenement ceased. In 2015, the railroad sold the dominant tenement and an adjacent parcel (JHP property) and expressly conveyed to JHP its rights under the easement, although the deed contained no warranty regarding the continued existence of such rights. Visitacion, planning a large, mixed-use residential development and hoping to use the land that was encumbered by the easement, brought a quiet title action, alleging that the easement has been extinguished under the doctrine of abandonment. JHP denied abandonment and sought to establish its “full and complete legal and equitable ownership.”The court of appeal reversed the grant of summary judgment to JHP. Given the ambiguity of the easement deed and the uncertain state of the evidence bearing on its origination and use, the trial court erred in construing the deed in the context of these cross-motions for summary judgment. Visitacion’s evidence, if accepted, could establish abandonment. View "Visitacion Investment LLC v. 424 Jessie Historic Properties LLC" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs Richard Lauckhart and Sharon and Ronald Baumgartner as trustees of the Baumgartner Family Revocable Trust filed suit to prevent defendant El Macero Homeowners Association, a California nonprofit mutual benefit corporation (the Association), from acquiring property as common area and subjecting the plaintiffs’ residential subdivision to the requirements of the Davis-Stirling Common Interest Development Act, including the levy of assessments to maintain the common area. In their second amended complaint, plaintiffs sought to cancel due to fraud a recorded declaration of covenants, conditions, and restrictions (CC&Rs) under which the Association acts, enjoin the Association from accepting real property as common area or using assessments to fund its maintenance, and receive a judicial declaration that the declaration of CC&Rs was void and that the subdivision was not subject to the Davis-Stirling Act. The trial court sustained a general demurrer to the second amended complaint without leave to amend, finding the cancelation cause of action was time barred and did not plead fraud with particularity, the Association’s acquisition of the land was protected under the business judgment rule and could not be enjoined, and the request for declaratory relief was derivative of the other dismissed causes of action. Finding no reversible error in this judgment, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "Lauckhart v. El Macero Homeowners Assn." on Justia Law