SM 10000 Property v. Chakchay CA2/5

Opinion

Filed 9/9/26 SM 10000 Property v. Chakchay CA2/5 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). Ther opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION FIVE

SM 10000 PROPERTY, LLC, B350752

Plaintiff and Appellant, (Los Angeles County Super. Ct. v. No. 24SMCV03946)

MICHEL CHAKCHAY, et al., Defendants and Respondents.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, Elaine W. Mandel and David W. Swift, Judges. Dismissed in part and affirmed in part. Lorber, Greenfield, and Olsen, Thomas F. Olsen and Daniel E. Ishu, for Plaintiff and Appellant. Law Office of Kevin P. Hermansen and Kevin Hermansen; Law Office of Ben Gharagozli and Ben Gharagozli, for Defendants and Respondents. Plaintiff and appellant SM 10000 Property, LLC (landlord) filed an unlawful detainer action against defendants and respondents Michel Chakchay, Georgio Chakchay, and Maya Haider (collectively, tenants).1 After a bench trial, the trial court entered judgment in favor of tenants, and several months later granted tenants’ post-judgment motion for attorney fees. Landlord then filed a single notice of appeal as to both the judgment and the attorney fee award. We dismiss as untimely the portion of landlord’s appeal challenging the judgment, and we affirm the attorney fee award.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On August 14, 2024, landlord filed an unlawful detainer complaint, naming tenants as defendants. The complaint sought possession of a specified unit at 10000 Santa Monica Boulevard in Los Angeles, California, as well as damages and an award of reasonable attorney fees. Landlord checked the box on the form complaint stating that “A written agreement between the parties provides for attorney fees.” The complaint attached a copy of the lease agreement between Michel and landlord. The lease agreement identified Georgio and Maya as “Minor Resident(s) and/or Other Occupants.” It also included an attorney fee 1 The complaint also named Samantha Rayner as a defendant, but because that name does not appear in the judgment or post-judgment order on appeal, we do not include her as a party in our discussion. Also, because two of the defendants share the same last name, we will refer to all three defendants by first name, with no disrespect to the parties intended.

2 provision stating: “In the event of any litigation to enforce this Lease, the prevailing party shall be entitled to recover its reasonable attorneys’ fees, not to exceed a total of Fifty thousand dollars ($50,000.00), and additionally, its costs of litigation.” Tenants’ answer asserted a general denial and various affirmative defenses, including defective service of the 3-day Notice to Pay or Quit. The answer sought an award of costs, including reasonable attorney fees.2 The trial court conducted a one-day bench trial on March 24, 2025, and took the matter under submission. A minute order dated March 25, 2025, found that service of the 3- day Notice to Pay or Quit was not proper under Code of Civil Procedure section 1162, subdivision (a)(3),3 but rejected several other affirmative defenses argued at trial. The minute order announced judgment in favor of tenants and directed tenants’ attorney to prepare a proposed judgment and serve it on landlord’s counsel for review, prior to submitting it to the court for signature. Judgment was entered on May 6, 2025, against landlord and in favor of tenants. After judgment was entered, tenants filed a motion for attorney’s fees on May 28, 2025, seeking $50,000, the maximum amount of attorney fees recoverable under the lease agreement’s attorney fee clause. Landlord filed an opposition, arguing that 2 For some reason, the copy of tenants’ answer included in the clerk’s transcript is missing a large amount of text, but our characterization of the answer, based on the visible text, is not an area of dispute between the parties.

3 All further statutory references are to the Code of Civil Procedure unless otherwise stated.

3 because Michel was the only signatory to the lease, only he could recover attorney fees. Landlord also argued that tenants’ counsel had engaged in block billing, placing distinct tasks under combined time entries, and that the trial court should significantly reduce the amount of fees awarded for the block billed time entries. Tenants filed a reply brief countering landlord’s arguments. On September 29, 2025, the court granted tenants’ motion, awarding attorney fees in the amount of $50,000, and ordering that the May 6, 2025 judgment be interlineated to include those fees. On October 28, 2025, landlord filed a notice of appeal. The notice stated that landlord was appealing from a judgment after court trial, and described the date of the judgment or order as follows: “May 6, 2025, Motion for Attorney Fees held September 29, 2025.”

DISCUSSION

A. Timeliness of Landlord’s Appeal Tenants filed a motion to dismiss landlord’s appeal, arguing that the appeal of the judgment was untimely under California Rules of Court, rule 8.104(a)(1)(A), because landlord’s notice of appeal was filed on October 28, 2025, more than 60 days after the court clerk served a filed-endorsed copy of the judgment on all parties. The motion to dismiss included a motion to augment the appellate record with a copy of the clerk’s certificate of mailing, showing that the judgment was served by mail on May 6, 2025. Landlord did not address the timeliness of its 4 appeal of the judgment in its opening brief, nor did it file any opposition to tenants’ motion to dismiss the appeal. (See Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.54(c) [“failure to oppose a motion may be deemed a consent to the granting of the motion”].) In its reply brief, landlord argues that because the judgment left a blank for an attorney fee award, it was not a final judgment. We reject landlord’s argument. The trial court’s order on September 29, 2025, granting tenants’ motion for attorney fees and directing the judgment to be interlineated to incorporate the fee award did not restart the time to appeal from the May 6, 2025 judgment. An amended judgment that merely adds costs and attorney fees is not substantially changed and the time to appeal the original judgment is not affected. (Torres v. City of San Diego (2007) 154 Cal.App.4th 214, 222; Eisenberg et al., Cal. Practice Guide: Civil Appeals & Writs (The Rutter Group 2026) § 3:56.3.) “[I]t makes sense to conclude that a separately appealable order after final judgment does not substantially modify the judgment itself for purposes of computing the time in which to file a notice of appeal. Any problem the parties might have with the amendment can be pursued through a separate appeal of the postjudgment order.” (Dakota Payphone, LLC v. Alcaraz (2011) 192 Cal.App.4th 493, 505 [describing Torres as following cases holding postjudgment awards of attorney fees and costs are separately appealable matters that do not restart the clock on time to appeal judgment]; cf. Nellie Gail Ranch Owners Assn. v. McMullin (2016) 4 Cal.App.5th 982, 1010 [dismissing appeal of postjudgment order awarding attorney fees and costs because the order was separately appealable and was not listed in notice of appeal of judgment as an order appealed].)

5 We grant tenants’ motion to augment, and we also grant in part their motion to dismiss, as to the judgment only. Because the notice of appeal was filed less than 60 days after the trial court granted tenants’ post-judgment motion for attorney fees, we proceed to consider the merits of that portion of landlord’s appeal.

B. Attorney Fee Award Landlord contends the trial court erred when it granted tenants’ motion for attorney fees and seeks a reversal with directions on remand for the trial court to conduct a new lodestar analysis, reducing the claimed amount for block billing, duplicative work, and “other deficiencies identified by [landlord.]” Landlord makes two distinct contentions of error. First, it contends that because Michel was the only signatory to the lease agreement, Maya and Georgio cannot recover contractual attorney fees. Second, landlord argues that the trial court erred when it ignored landlord’s objections to specific block-billed, vague, or duplicative entries by tenants’ counsel. “ ‘ “On review of an award of attorney fees after trial, the normal standard of review is abuse of discretion. However, de novo review of such a trial court order is warranted where the determination of whether the criteria for an award of attorney fees and costs in this context have been satisfied amounts to statutory construction and a question of law.” ’ [Citation.] In other words, ‘it is a discretionary trial court decision on the propriety or amount of statutory attorney fees to be awarded, but a determination of the legal basis for an attorney fee award is a question of law to be reviewed de novo.’ ” (Mountain Air 6 Enterprises, LLC v. Sundowner Towers, LLC (2017) 3 Cal.5th 744, 751 (Mountain Air).) “ ‘A party may not recover attorney fees unless expressly authorized by statute or contract. [Citations.] In the absence of a statute authorizing the recovery of attorney fees, the parties may agree on whether and how to allocate attorney fees. [Citation.] They may agree the prevailing party will be awarded all the attorney fees incurred in any litigation between them, limit the recovery of fees only to claims arising from certain transactions or events, or award them only on certain types of claims. The parties may agree to award attorney fees on claims sounding in both contract and tort.’ (Brown Bark III, L.P. v. Haver (2013) 219 Cal.App.4th 809, 818 (Brown Bark).)” (Hom v. Petrou (2021) 67 Cal.App.5th 459, 464 (Hom).) Section 1033.5 specifies that costs recoverable under section 1032 include attorney fees when authorized by contract, statute, or law. (§ 1033.5, subd. (a)(10)(A)–(C); Santisas v. Goodin (1998) 17 Cal.4th 599, 606 (Santisas) [costs allowable under section 1032 include attorney fees “only when the party entitled to costs has a legal basis, independent of the cost statutes and grounded in an agreement, statute, or other law, upon which to claim recovery of attorney fees”].) “If a contractual attorney fee provision is phrased broadly enough . . . it may support an award of attorney fees to the prevailing party in an action alleging both contract and tort claims: ‘[P]arties may validly agree that the prevailing party will be awarded attorney fees incurred in any litigation between themselves, whether such litigation sounds in tort or in contract.’ ” (Santisas, supra, 17 Cal.4th at p. 608; see also Mountain Air, supra, 3 Cal.5th at p. 751.)

7 Here, the contract provided: “In the event of any litigation to enforce this Lease, the prevailing party shall be entitled to recover its reasonable attorneys’ fees, not to exceed a total of Fifty thousand dollars ($50,000.00), and additionally, its costs of litigation.” Landlord contends without any supporting authority that “The ‘prevailing party’ under a contractual fee provision must be a party to the contract.” A “prevailing party” is defined in statute as including “the party with a net monetary recovery, a defendant in whose favor a dismissal is entered, a defendant where neither plaintiff nor defendant obtains any relief, and a defendant as against those plaintiffs who do not recover any relief against that defendant.” (§ 1032, subd. (a)(4), italics added.) Georgio and Maya were named as defendants in the unlawful detainer action, and although they were not signatories on the lease, they were named in the lease as occupants of the premises, permitting them to seek attorney fees as third party beneficiaries. (Hom, supra, 67 Cal.App.5th at pp. at pp. 471−472.) In addition, to the extent that an unlawful detainer action may sound in either contract or tort (Mitchell Land & Improvement Co. v. Ristorante Ferrantelli, Inc. (2007) 158 Cal.App.4th 479, 486–487), there is no “per se rule barring nonsignatories from collecting attorney’s fees on tort claims under a contractual fees provision.” (Hom, supra, 67 Cal.App.5th at pp. 467–470.) Next, landlord argues that the trial court erroneously ignored its objections to tenants’ attorneys’ billing entries, where landlord made a general argument that tenants’ attorneys had improperly engaged in block-billing, and then listed four pages of entries, with an introductory paragraph arguing that the entries were vague because they identified more than one activity, such 8 as preparing for and attending a hearing. Having reviewed the entries, we find no prejudicial error. Tenants’ motion for attorney fees identified 134.5 hours of attorney time at an hourly rate of $550, for a total of $73,865 in attorney fees. Even if there were 40 hours of excessive or improper time, which is not apparent from the record, the trial court would still have a basis to award the contractual limit of $50,000 in fees. The fee award was well within the trial court’s discretion.

DISPOSITION

The appeal by plaintiff and appellant SM 10000 Property, LLC of the judgment entered on May 6, 2025, is dismissed. The court’s September 29, 2025 order granting attorney fees to defendants and respondents Michel Chakchay, Georgio Chakchay, and Maya Haider is affirmed, and those same defendants are awarded their costs on appeal. NOT TO BE PUBLISHED.

MOOR, J.

WE CONCUR:

HOFFSTADT, P. J.

BAKER, J.