Category: Real Property Law

Moore v. The Radburn Association, Inc.

PREDFDA — The 1993 amendments to PREDFDA apply retroactively to common ownership communities even to those communities that were already in existence before the original PREDFDA statute was enacted.

• Opinion Date: March 18, 2010

Bernstein v. Shulman

LANDLORD-TENANT; COLLATERAL ESTOPPEL — The findings of a landlord-tenant court may collaterally estop the same parties in a future action if the later tried issues are identical, were litigated in the landlord-tenant proceeding where determination of the issue was essential to the outcome, where the party against whom collateral estoppel is asserted is a party to the landlord-tenant action, and the landlord-tenant court issued a final judgment on the merits.

• Opinion Date: April 1, 2010

Cargill Global Trading v. Applied Development Company

MORTGAGES; PREPAYMENT; HUD — Where a mortgage allows a borrower to exempt itself from a prepayment penalty if it obtains HUD approval, so long as the borrower does not intentionally, and with malice, sabotage its financial standing just to obtain HUD approval, the borrower does not need to first negotiate with its lender even if that is the custom for such a type of mortgage.

• Opinion Date: April 21, 2010

Roosevelt Avenue Properties, LLC v. Zoning Board of Adjustment of The Township of Ocean

ZONING; NON-CONFORMING USES — Statutory and case law clearly establish that the burden of proving a pre-existing non-conforming use is on the person asserting such a use and a municipality’s lack of records has no bearing on the allocation of that burden.

• Opinion Date: May 27, 2010

Borough of Ridgefield v. Borough of Ridgefield Zoning Board of Adjustment

ZONING; MUNICIPALITIES; STANDING —For a municipality to have standing to challenge a zoning board’s grant of a variance, it needs to show that the proposed use would substantially alter the character of its zoning plan.

• Opinion Date: June 15, 2010

Wachovia Cust. for Plymouth Park Tax Service, L.L.C. v. Pitts

TAX SALES; INTERVENORS — A third-party may redeem a tax sales certificate after the filing of a foreclosure action so long as the third-party timely intervenes in the action and pays the property owner more than nominal consideration for the property.

• Opinion Date: June 24, 2010

Laverty v. AGTO, LLC

LEASES; ABANDONMENT — The conduct of a landlord and a tenant can result in a finding that their lease had been abandoned.

• Opinion Date: August 10, 2010

Bell v. Tower Management Services, L.P.

LANDLORD-TENANT; DISCRIMINATION —Where a landlord refuses to include the amount of a rental subsidiary a disabled tenant receives from the state as part of that tenant’s qualifying income, the tenant will be given an opportunity to argue the novel disability discrimination theory that the landlord is, in essence, discriminating against the tenant because of the tenant’s disability.

• Opinion Date: April 26, 2010

New York SMSA Limited Partnership v. Zoning Board of Adjustment of the Borough of Tenafly

ZONING; TELECOMMUNICATIONS — Where a telecommunications company’s use variance application is not based on the Telecommunication’s Act, the proper test to satisfy the positive criteria is whether the use is particularly suited for that site without imposing any necessity for the applicant to show that the chosen site is the least intrusive site.

• Opinion Date: July 21, 2010

Dhall v. 700 Grove Street Urban Renewal, L.L.C.

CONTRACTS; RESCISSION — An amendment to a contract for the sale of a new condominium unit does not require inclusion of a seven day cancellation notice, as is required of new condominium contracts under law, when the amendment unambiguously provides that it is to become part of the original agreement.

• Opinion Date: June 15, 2010