Real Property Law
California Case Summary Update: September 2025 Real Property Case Summaries
September 2025
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CALIFORNIA COURTS OF APPEAL
Landlord-Tenant
Emmons v. Jesso (2025) __ Cal.App.5th __, 2025 WL 2462709: The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s judgment for defendant/cross-complainant landlord, following a jury trial, awarding defendant of $14,700 plus interest and costs on defendant’s cross-complaint for rent not paid. The Court of Appeal affirmed, rejecting plaintiff tenant’s arguments that the unit was illegal and that the landlord was barred from recovering rent, and holding that the jury properly resolved disputed factual issues regarding the legality of the unit, waiver, and estoppel, and that substantial evidence supported the landlord’s compliance with registration requirements under the rent stabilization ordinance. (C.A. 2nd, August 27, 2025.)
Real Property
CP VI Admirals Cove, LLC v. City of Alameda (2025) __ Cal.App.5th __, 2025 WL 2490645:
The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order granting a petition for a writ of mandate and concluding that an exemption from local rent control under the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act (Civ. Code, § 1954.50 et seq.) applied to plaintiff’s development in Alameda, which improved real property by rehabilitating 150 residential units on the property previously used as housing for military personnel and their families. The Court of Appeal disagreed, concluding that under NCR Properties, LLC v. City of Berkeley (2023)
89 Cal.App.5th 39 and Burien, LLC v. Wiley (2014) 230 Cal.App.4th 1039, the exemption applied only to certificates of occupancy issued before any residential use of the property, and that the extensive renovation of previously residential military housing did not create new housing exempt from rent control. (C.A. 1st, August 29, 2025.)
Sandton Agriculture Investments III, LLC v. 4-S Ranch Partners, LLC (2025) __ Cal.App.5th __, 2025 WL 2267602: The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s order granting plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment and concluding that the groundwater and floodwater stored in an aquifer beneath defendant’s land were part of the real property, not personal property, and thus passed to the plaintiff purchaser at the nonjudicial foreclosure sale. The Court of Appeal agreed and affirmed, concluding that under California law, water in its natural state remains real property unless severed from the land. It rejected defendant’s argument that the foreclosure sale did not transfer rights to the water because it became personal property upon entering the land. (C.A. 5th, August 8, 2025).
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