Question of Fact Whether Tenants Entitled to Equitable Renewal of Lease
The Second Department determined issues of fact were raised concerning whether the tenants should be allowed to remain in the leased premises. Although the written option to renew the lease was never executed. the tenants alleged that oral assurances the tenants could remain were made by the landlord:
Although the documentary evidence conclusively established that the [tenants] failed to exercise the option to renew in accordance with the express terms of the lease …., contrary to [the landlord’s] contention, that evidence failed to conclusively establish that the [tenants] were not entitled to equitable renewal of the lease. Equity will intervene to relieve a commercial tenant’s failure to timely exercise an option to renew in accordance with the terms of the lease where “(1) the tenant’s failure to exercise the option in a timely fashion resulted from an honest mistake or inadvertence, (2) the nonrenewal of the lease would result in a substantial forfeiture by the tenant, and (3) the landlord would not be prejudiced by the renewal” … .
Here, the record reveals the existence of issues of fact as to whether the [tenants’] failure to exercise the option in accordance with the terms of the lease resulted from their mistaken belief that alleged discussions with [tenant’s agent] were sufficient to exercise the option, whether nonrenewal of the lease would result in the [tenants’] substantial forfeiture of a benefit as a result of the loss of valuable goodwill that they established at the present location, and whether [the landlord] would suffer prejudice if the lease were renewed… . Waterfalls Italian Cuisine Inc v Tamarin, 2014 NY Slip Op 05323, 2nd Dept 7-16-14