Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
APPEALS from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County No. YC050632, Deanne Smith Myers, Judge. Affirmed.
Perona, Langer, Beck & Serbin, Ronald Beck and Ellen R. Serbin for Plaintiffs and Appellants.
Ford, Walker, Haggerty & Behar, Charles J. Schmitt, James O. Miller, Maxine J. Lebowitz; Law Offices of Arthur W. Francis, Jr. and Arthur W. Francis, Jr. for Defendant and Appellant.
JACKSON, J.
INTRODUCTION
Defendant Marcella Doran (Doran) appeals a judgment in favor of plaintiffs August and Linda Phillips (the Phillipses), and the Phillipses cross-appeal from the same judgment. Doran challenges the trial court’s determination that the Phillipses had an irrevocable license on an approximately three-foot area on Doran’s side of her boundary line. The Phillipses challenge the trial court’s decision not to allow them to reopen the case to insert a legal description for the disputed area. We affirm the judgment.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
The parties own adjoining homes in Redondo Beach. Doran has owned and lived in her home since 1955. The Phillipses have owned their home since 1972 and lived there until 1973, and again from 1992 until 1996. Doran’s home is located down slope from the Phillipses’ property.
In 1992, Doran had a retaining wall built on her property about three feet inside the boundary of her property next to the Phillipses’ property. As a result of the construction of the wall, lateral support problems developed on the Phillipses’ property resulting in litigation. Doran’s insurer settled with the Phillipses.
Construction of the retaining wall left an approximate three-foot wide strip of land running the length of the 112-foot boundary between the two lots. The three-foot strip was on Doran’s property and was not maintained by Doran. A dispute concerning maintenance of the three-foot strip resulted in letters being sent in 1996 by attorneys representing the parties in an effort to resolve the use of the disputed area. The parties did not have any direct communication with one another.
On March 26, 1996, Attorney Stephen Goldberg, representing the Phillipses, sent a letter to Attorney Arthur Francis, representing Doran, affirming that an “agreement” had been reached on a number of issues, including landscaping and maintenance of the disputed area. The letter did not state the length of the agreement.
On April 3, 1996, Mr. Francis sent a letter requesting that certain changes to the agreement be made and that it be redrafted to reflect the changes. Despite the requested changes, Mr. Francis confirmed that his client “agreed in principal [sic]” with the terms set forth in the March 26th letter. The agreement was never redrafted or signed and no other letters were exchanged between the parties.
The Phillipses intended the agreement to be permanent and forever. Mr. Goldberg testified that he and Mr. Francis shared the goal of ending the “battle forever” over the use of the disputed area. Doran testified that it was never her intention to give anyone the property on the other side of the wall forever.
The Phillipses landscaped and maintained the disputed area. They planted grass and installed a sprinkler system. They maintained the disputed area until approximately 2002. In or about 2002, Doran turned off the sprinklers that were watering the disputed area because of water damage to her retaining wall.
On May 2, 2005, Mr. Francis sent a letter to Mr. Goldberg in which Doran irrevocably rescinded any permission to use the disputed area.
The Phillipses sued for injunctive relief and a declaration that they had an irrevocable license, or in the alternative, a prescriptive easement to use the disputed area. Doran asserted that she had a right to revoke the license. The trial court denied injunctive relief and no prescriptive easement was found. The matter was heard as a bench trial on the sole issue of whether Doran could revoke the license she had granted.
On June 26, 2006, the trial court issued a statement of decision finding only a revocable license and as an equitable matter, the Phillipses’ expenditures in maintaining the area were not so significant that the license had become irrevocable.
The Phillipses objected and the trial court modified its decision. The trial court found that while “an irrevocable license is something of an anomaly, it appears that the parties [had created] an irrevocable license” but made “no finding on the nature of this irrevocable license and/or whether it is to be treated as an easement or is enforceable by any successor.”
The Phillipses filed a motion to reopen the case on the ground they had inadvertently failed to offer evidence of a legal description of the disputed area at trial. Doran claimed that there was no need for a property description to be introduced into evidence; there was no dispute that the “disputed area” was simply that area on Doran’s property lying on the Phillipses’ side of the wall.
DISCUSSION
A. License
Doran contends that the finding of an irrevocable license is not supported by substantial evidence. We disagree.
When the trial court’s factual findings have been challenged on appeal, the scope of appellate review is limited to a determination whether substantial evidence exists which will support the trial court’s conclusion. (Hellman v. La Cumbre Golf & Country Club (1992) 6 Cal.App.4th 1224, 1229.) Substantial evidence is evidence of ponderable legal significance. (Bowers v. Bernards (1984) 150 Cal.App.3d 870, 873.) The trial court’s findings of fact will be reversed on appeal only if they are unsupported by substantial evidence. (Watson v. Department of Rehabilitation (1989) 212 Cal.App.3d 1271, 1289.)
On appeal, we view the entire record to determine if there is substantial evidence, contradicted or uncontradicted, which supports the findings. (Bowers v. Bernards, supra, 150 Cal.App.3d at pp. 873-874.) The trial court, as trier of fact, has the duty to weigh and interpret the evidence and draw reasonable inferences therefrom. (In re Cheryl E. (1984) 161 Cal.App.3d 587, 598.) We cannot reweigh the evidence or draw contrary inferences. (Ibid.) Thus, we must resolve all conflicts in the evidence and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the findings. (Watson v. Department of Rehabilitation, supra, 212 Cal.App.3d at p. 1289.) Evidence accepted by the trial court as true may not be rejected by the appellate court unless it is physically impossible or its falsity is obvious without resort to inference or deduction. (Id. at p. 1293.)
The general rule is that a license in real property may be revoked at any time at the pleasure of the licensor. However, a license may become irrevocable under some circumstances. (Belmont County Water Dist. v. State of California (1976) 65 Cal.App.3d 13, 17). For example, it may become irrevocable if the licensee has made substantial expenditures in reasonable reliance on the representation by the licensor. (Ibid.) In the instant case, the trial court specifically stated that the Phillipses’ landscaping of the disputed strip of land was not a sufficient expenditure of money to estop Doran from revoking the license.
The question thus becomes whether an irrevocable license was created by agreement between the parties. There is no statute or case law that provides that an agreement must state that the license is irrevocable. It is certainly within the province of the trial court to determine, from the evidence presented, that the parties intended the license to be irrevocable.
In Golden West Baseball Co. v. City of Anaheim (1994) 25 Cal.App.4th 11, the owner of the Angels baseball team entered into an agreement with the City of Anaheim to use the stadium and parking lot for the Angels’ home games. Several years later, the City granted a conditional use permit to a stadium development group to construct an office complex on part of the parking lot. The owner of the Angels sued on the grounds that the proposed development breached its “lease” with the City. (Id. at pp. 18-19.)
The City’s agreement with the plaintiff was ambiguous as to whether the parties intended a lease or license to use the parking lot. The trial court, after weighing the extrinsic evidence, concluded that the plaintiff had a “leasehold interest” in the stadium and parking lot on game days and the proposed office complex breached the lease. (Golden West Baseball Co. v. City of Anaheim, supra, 25 Cal.App.4th at pp. 28-30.) On appeal, the Court of Appeal disagreed with the trial court’s conclusion that the plaintiff’s agreement with the City was a lease. (Id. at p. 30.) The Court of Appeal suggested that the plaintiff’s interest in the parking lot might be described as “an irrevocable license” or an easement. (Id. at p. 36.) The court noted that like an easement, a license is an interest in property even though it is less than an estate. A license is normally revocable at will. The court went on to say that a license “which is not terminable at will is somewhat anomalous [citation], it has been recognized.” (Ibid.)
Following Golden West, the court in Qualls v. Lake Berryessa Enterprises, Inc. (1999) 76 Cal.App.4th 1277 concluded that a written agreement between a mobilehome owner and a resort operator for the use of a space was akin to an “irrevocable license,” and the license was enforceable by a breach of contract action. (Id. at pp. 1285-1286.) The Qualls court indicated that parties’ rights and obligations are determined by the interpretation of their agreement. As stated in Qualls, “[i]n other words, the contract between the parties may contain terms that give greater rights to a contracting party than would be accorded by the common law, such as, for example, an irrevocable license or the incorporation of specific terms relating to termination.” (Id. at p. 1285.)
In the instant matter, the trial court based its decision in part on the extrinsic evidence presented at trial as to the duration of the license. In its ruling on submitted matter, the trial court stated as follows: “Looking to extrinsic evidence as to the duration of the license, Mrs. Phillips testified she intended this agreement for the 3' strip of land plus tree height to be forever. Mr. Goldberg testified that both he and Mr. Francis (who negotiated for Mrs. Doran) intended this agreement to be permanent between the parties (‘Mr. Francis and I did discuss the specific objective of ending this battle forever. That was the goal that I expressed and that was the goal that he expressed.’).”
During his trial testimony, Mr. Goldberg testified that he was trying to put an end to the modern day version of the Hatfields and McCoys. Mrs. Phillips testified that the agreement with Doran to maintain the disputed area “had to be permanent or nothing.”
The letter of March 26, 1996, from Mr. Goldberg to Mr. Francis discussed Doran’s obligation to trim her trees. Pursuant to the letter, Doran agreed to “trim the tree in her backyard to restore the view from my clients’ property, and will continue to maintain the tree at a level which does not impair my clients’ view.” This language was not objected to in Mr. Francis’s letter of April 3, 1996. Nothing in the letters exchanged between the attorneys specified that Doran’s duty to trim her trees was temporary.
Doran’s reliance on Cooke v. Ramponi (1952) 38 Cal.2d 282 is misplaced. In Cooke, there was an agreement by predecessors in interest of adjoining properties that the licensee could build and maintain a road to his property over the licensor’s property. The plaintiffs continued to use and maintain the roadway at their expense until defendants barricaded the roadway and denied them access. The trial court found an irrevocable license. (Id. at p. 286.) The Cooke court ruled that “the assailed judgment need not rest on [the] theory of estoppel. Rather the record establishes an executed, irrevocable parol license in favor of plaintiffs as the result of their respective agreements with the state’s successors in interest . . . and the mutual performance of the parties thereunder.” (Id. at p. 287.)
The Cooke decision did not rest on the theory of estoppel to find an irrevocable license but rather on the finding that the parties entered into a binding agreement. In the instant case, the trial court also found that the parties had entered into a binding agreement that gave the Phillipses the irrevocable license to landscape the three foot area at their own expense.
Kaler v. Brown (1951) 101 Cal.App.2d 716, relied upon by Doran, is distinguishable. In Kaler, the plaintiffs constructed a driveway on the defendant’s property to access their garage. There was very little money expended and the driveway was seldom used. (Id. at p. 717.) A dispute over the use of the driveway arose, culminating in a lawsuit. (Id. at pp. 717-718.) The court held that “[f]rom the undisputed evidence the permission appeared to be merely a neighborly accommodation to both parties without any agreement or understanding that it was to continue for any definite time.” (Id. at p. 719.)
While the court found, in Kaler, that there was no agreement as to how long plaintiffs would be allowed to use the driveway, in the instant case the trial court found that there was evidence of an agreement between the parties concerning use of the disputed area. Viewing the record as a whole, there was substantial evidence to support the trial court’s decision that the license was irrevocable.
B. Duration of License
Doran asks us to find that the license, even if irrevocable, does not benefit successors. The trial court specifically stated that it “makes no finding on the nature of this irrevocable license and/or whether it is to be treated as an easement or is enforceable by any successor.” We decline Doran’s request.
Doran seeks to have us to rule on a matter that is not ripe for decision, in that the parties still own their respective properties. Moreover, we are not inclined to substitute our judgment in place of the trial court’s findings. (Harms v. Reed (1946) 73 Cal.App.2d 853, 861.)
C. The Phillipses’ Request to Reopen
The Phillipses’ cross-appeal seeks to reopen the case so they may submit a legal description of the disputed property. We decline their request.
A party’s right to reopen a case following trial and before entry of judgment is a matter that “rests upon the sound discretion of the trial court.” (Sanchez v. Bay General Hospital (1981) 116 Cal.App.3d 776, 793.)
The Phillipses sought to reopen the case on the ground they inadvertently failed to offer evidence of a legal description of the disputed area at trial and only recognized this error after the trial court issued its statement of decision. Doran submits that there is no dispute that the “disputed area” is on Doran’s property, on the Phillipses’ side of Doran’s wall.
We find no abuse of discretion in the trial court’s refusal to reopen the case. There is no issue as to where the land is located and inclusion of a legal description in the judgment is unnecessary.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed. The parties are to bear their own costs on appeal.
We concur: PERLUSS, P. J., ZELON, J.