Boston LLC v. Juarez (2015)

Citation: Boston LLC v. Juarez (2015)
Parent Document: Boston LLC v. Juarez (2015)
Jurisdiction: California (state)
Effective Date: 2015-10-02
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3006950/boston-llc-v-juarez/ ↗

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term will allow the landlord to forfeit the agreement and terminate the tenant’s right to
possession.
The rule created by the majority is contrary to decades of jurisprudence requiring a
breach to be material in order to justify contractual forfeiture. Neither the majority nor
the landlord cite any published authority in California or any other state standing for the
proposition that a lease is properly subject to forfeiture upon an immaterial breach.
In fact, a plethora of published authority has held to the contrary. In deciding
forfeiture for a trivial breach of a lease should not be enforced, the Arizona Supreme
Court recognized as much:1 “[A]n overwhelming majority of courts[2] has concluded,
without reference to a specific statutory provision, that a lease may not be forfeited for a
trivial or technical breach even where the parties have specifically agreed that ‘any
breach’ gives rise to the right of termination. [Citation.] These courts note the
sophistication and complexity of most business interactions and are concerned, therefore,
that the possibilities for breach of a modern commercial lease are virtually limitless. In
their view, the parties to the lease did not intend that every minor or technical failure to
adhere to complicated lease provisions could cause forfeiture. Accordingly, nearly all
courts hold that, regardless of the language of the lease, to justify forfeiture, the breach
must be ‘material,’ ‘serious,’ or ‘substantial.’” (Foundation Dev. Corp. v. Loehmann’s
(1990) 163 Ariz. 438, 445 (Loehmann’s).)

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