Case Law Summaries

Coinmach Corporation v. Murnick

• Opinion Date: October 2, 2001
• Real Property Law
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LEASES; DEFAULTS; NOTICE—A general lease provision requiring a notice of default is overridden by a specific lease provision allowing for immediate termination by notice to a tenant that its rent is due and unpaid.

A building owner leased space to a company that provided laundry machine equipment to the building’s tenants. The laundry company failed to pay two consecutive monthly installments of rent and the building owner terminated the lease by giving the tenant written notice of the termination. Thereafter, the laundry company paid the prior two months’ rent and sued, claiming that the lease had been wrongfully terminated. The lower court granted summary judgment to the building owner. The laundry company appealed. The Appellate Division reviewed the pertinent provisions of the lease and concluded that although a paragraph in the lease governing default required that the building owner give the laundry company a 30-day written notice of default, the subsequent paragraph provided that this 30-day written notice requirement did not apply to defaults for non-payment of rent. The Court also recognized that the rider to the lease dealt specifically with non-payment of rent. The rider provided that “if rent is not received by the 10th of the month due, then the Lease is in default and if such default is not cured before the 30th day of the month, the Lease may be terminated by written notice and Lessee shall remove its equipment from the premises.” On this basis, the Court concluded that proper notice of the termination was given and that, in light of the fact that the tenant operated its business in more than 2,500 other locations in the region, the laundry company’s breach of non-payment of rent could not be attributable to its lack of knowledge in the negotiation or understanding of the terms of the lease.

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