COAST FEDERAL SAVINGS AND LOAN ASSOCIATION, A UNITED STATES CORPORATION, APPELLANT,
v.
GUION T. DELOACH, APPELLEE

Fla. 2d DCA | 1979-10-17
No. 77-1424
HOBSON, Acting C. J., and BOARD-MAN, J., concur.
376 So. 2d 1190 Florida District Court of Appeal, Second District (1979) Positive Treatment
Cited by 2 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

Coast Federal Savings and Loan appealed a trial court judgment that improperly reduced its accelerated rent recovery by 80% for allegedly failing to mitigate damages. The court clarified on remand that as lessor, Coast Federal had no duty to mitigate and had not retaken possession, thus the reduction was erroneous.


Holding

A lessor has no duty to mitigate damages upon breach by the lessee. The trial court erred in reducing Coast Federal's recovery by 80% for failure to mitigate when it had not retaken possession and had no such duty.


Headnotes

[1] A lessor has no duty to mitigate damages upon breach by the lessee of a lease agreement if the lease does not require the lessor to retake possession for the lessee's acc…

[2] A trial court lacks jurisdiction to enter an amended judgment after jurisdiction has been relinquished to an appellate court for a specific factual finding.

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Key Quotes

“the lessor (Coast Federal) had no duty to mitigate damages upon breach by the lessee (DeLoach) of the terms of the lease agreement”

Establishes the primary legal holding that lessors lack a mitigation duty

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Facts & Procedural History

Coast Federal and DeLoach entered into a lease agreement. DeLoach breached the lease terms. The trial court found Coast Federal entitled to accelerate…

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Opinion of the Court
DANAHY, Judge.

DANAHY, Judge.

This court previously rendered an opinion in this case in which we pointed out that the lessor (Coast Federal) had no duty to mitigate damages upon breach by the lessee (DeLoach) of the terms of the lease agreement which underlies this suit. Coast Federal Savings & Loan Association v. DeLoach, 362 So. 2d 982 (Fla.2d DCA 1978). We expressed doubt whether the trial judge so held, or whether the trial judge found as a fact that Coast Federal retook possession of the leased premises for the account of DeLoach and failed to perform its duty to use good faith in reletting. Accordingly, we relinquished jurisdiction to the trial judge with instructions that he record his finding on the question whether Coast Federal retook possession of the leased premises for the account of DeLoach and submit that written finding to us.

The trial judge has now entered his written finding of fact that Coast Federal never retook possession of the leased premises. As pointed out in our prior opinion, Coast Federal had no duty to do so. It was, therefore, error for the trial judge, having found Coast Federal entitled to accelerated rent in the amount of $12,600, to reduce its recovery by 80% for failure to mitigate DeLoach’s damages.

Not only did the trial judge enter the written finding of fact which was the purpose of this court’s limited remand, he also entered an amended judgment in favor of Coast Federal in the full amount of $12,600 plus the sum of $750 as a reasonable attorney’s fee. Since our remand was solely for the purpose of allowing the entry of a written finding of fáct, the trial judge had no jurisdiction to enter an amended judgment in anticipation of this court’s reversal.

We note that DeLoach has also misconstrued the posture of this case by filing a motion for rehearing in the trial court directed to the amended final judgment. That motion argues points in his favor which are available to DeLoach only as grounds for reversal on his cross-appeal from the final judgment originally entered in this case. As stated in our prior opinion, we found no merit in any of the points raised by DeLoach on his cross-appeal. Points which could have been asserted on the cross-appeal, but were not, may not be asserted now. The matters set forth in DeLoach’s motion for rehearing are, therefore, foreclosed from consideration by the trial judge.

We come now to our final disposition of this appeal, the subject of which is the original final judgment entered on June 7, 1977. The final judgment is reversed with instructions to enter judgment in favor of Coast Federal consistent with this opinion and our previous opinion in this case.

REVERSED.

HOBSON, Acting C. J., and BOARD-MAN, J., concur.


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Citator

Cited By

  • Fairway Mortg. Solutions, Inc. v. Locust Gardens, 988 So. 2d 678 (Fla. 4th DCA 2008)
    …nant claimed that it was planning a future relocation, for which it enlisted the services of the broker. The landlord’s duty to exert a reasonable effort to mitigate did not arise until it retook the property. See Coast Fed. S & L Ass’n v. DeLoach, 376 So. 2d 1190, 1190-91 (Fla. 2d DCA 1979). This did not occur until August. Thus, the alleged failure of the broker to locate subtenants for the tenant is irrelevant to the landlord’s duty to mitigate. After opting to retake the property on the tenants’ behalf i…

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