Cases

California’s Mobilehome Residency Law (MRL) guarantees attorney fees and costs to prevailing parties in any action arising under that statute, including an action to enforce the MRL right to take free-and-clear title to property at a court-ordered sale.  GMSR’s client, mobilehome park owner Canyon View, brought quiet title actions against defendants that had recorded documents clouding Canyon View’s title to a mobilehome Canyon View acquired at a court-ordered sale under the MRL.

Canyon View appealed an award of MRL attorney fees on the ground that the award was based not on the hours billed or any other evidence presented in that case, but instead on the fee award that the same trial court awarded in a separate case against a separate defendant.  The Court of Appeal agreed, reversing the fee order “because it was based entirely on evidence in a separate action, not on any analysis of the work Canyon View claims its counsel performed in the instant action, and because the court employed an approach to calculating the amount that has no reasonable basis.”  In the same order, the Court of Appeal rejected a cross-appeal challenging Canyon View’s statutory right to fees.

To read the Court of Appeal Opinion, click HERE.