Greenacre Properties, Inc. v. Rao

933 So. 2d 19, 2006 Fla. App. LEXIS 6638, 2006 WL 1154757
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedMay 3, 2006
Docket2D04-5569
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 933 So. 2d 19 (Greenacre Properties, Inc. v. Rao) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Greenacre Properties, Inc. v. Rao, 933 So. 2d 19, 2006 Fla. App. LEXIS 6638, 2006 WL 1154757 (Fla. Ct. App. 2006).

Opinion

933 So.2d 19 (2006)

GREENACRE PROPERTIES, INC., Appellant,
v.
Radhakrishna K. RAO, Appellee.

No. 2D04-5569.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Second District.

May 3, 2006.

*20 Steven H. Mezer, Keith D. Skorewicz, and Eric N. Appleton of Bush Ross, P.A., Tampa, for Appellant.

Jennifer J. Card of Abbey, Adams, Byelick, Kiernan, Mueller & Lancaster, L.L.P., St. Petersburg, for Appellee.

ALTENBERND, Judge.

Greenacre Properties, Inc., appeals a final judgment in the amount of $9300 in favor of Dr. Radhakrishna K. Rao. We reverse because Dr. Rao was not an intended third-party beneficiary of the contract on which he sued; he was not entitled to damages under section 720.303(5), Florida Statutes (2000), against an entity that was not a homeowners' association; and he was not entitled to damages for lost income under a negligence theory when he had sustained no bodily injury or property damage.

I. THE FIRST LAWSUIT

Dr. Rao owns a home and resides in a community called Van Dyke Farms. As a result, he is a member of the Van Dyke Farms Homeowners' Association ("the Association"). In 1992, the Association entered into a contract with Greenacre Properties, a property management company, for the management of the Association and its community facilities. Under the contract, Greenacre Properties was specifically charged with maintaining the financial records and other records of the Association.

*21 Since 1999, Dr. Rao and the Association have been engaged in a bitter dispute that seems to have been engendered by the construction of a small pond in his yard.[1] Viewed in the light most favorable to Dr. Rao, the evidence presented in this case suggests Greenacre Properties may have advised the Association's board of directors that Dr. Rao was not in compliance with certain restrictive covenants and recommended the Association file suit at a time when Greenacre Properties knew or should have known that there were no existing violations. In May 1999, the Association filed a lawsuit against Dr. Rao and his wife, seeking injunctive relief related to alleged violations of deed restrictions. Dr. Rao responded to the complaint and, as part of his defense, alleged that the Association was selectively enforcing the restrictive covenants against him. Greenacre Properties was not a party to this previous lawsuit.

In October 2000, while this previous lawsuit was pending, Dr. Rao contacted Greenacre Properties and asked to review all files kept by Greenacre Properties for the Association for the period between January 1998 and November 2000. This request was apparently made as an indirect method to obtain discovery in the pending lawsuit between Dr. Rao and the Association. In November, Dr. Rao went to the offices of Greenacre Properties to review these records but was only permitted to review the "official records" of the Association as defined in section 720.303(4). The attorney for the Association had advised Greenacre Properties that it should only permit review of the official records and not all of the records in its possession.

The issues surrounding the production of these documents presumably could have been resolved in the previous lawsuit through motions to compel the Association to produce the documents. Apparently without a resolution of these issues, the lawsuit between the Association and Dr. Rao went to trial in September 2002. At the conclusion of that trial, the trial judge dismissed the Association's complaint for injunctive relief and rejected Dr. Rao's claims of selective enforcement. In his oral pronouncement, the trial judge opined that the protracted litigation between the parties was the result of a simple misunderstanding the parties should have resolved between themselves. The trial judge concluded that Dr. Rao was the prevailing party in the litigation and thus entitled to attorneys' fees pursuant to section 720.305(1). The trial judge limited the award of attorneys' fee to $5545, however, based upon a finding that both parties had incurred unnecessary or unreasonable attorneys' fees during the litigation.

II. THIS LAWSUIT

On January 23, 2001, while the lawsuit between Dr. Rao and the Association was still pending, Dr. Rao filed this lawsuit against Greenacre Properties. One count of the complaint against Greenacre Properties alleged that Greenacre Properties breached its contract with the Van Dyke Farms Homeowners' Association, based upon the theory that Dr. Rao had rights under that contract as a third-party beneficiary. This count claimed that Greenacre Properties breached the contract by failing to produce records to Dr. Rao for inspection, failing to adequately maintain the records of the Association, and failing to provide *22 Dr. Rao with "necessary notices" that the Association was required to send to Dr. Rao.

The second count of the complaint alleged that negligence on the part of Greenacre Properties resulted in damage to Dr. Rao. This count alleged that Greenacre Properties negligently performed its duties under the contract with the Association, specifically related to the requirement to provide certain notices to Dr. Rao or to keep and maintain the Association's records. This count stated, "As a result of [Greenacre Properties] failing to perform their duty under the Agreement, [Dr. Rao] has suffered damages, as well as emotional stress and physical hardships."

As Dr. Rao's case against Greenacre Properties progressed, it became clear that Dr. Rao was seeking as part of his damages the approximately $30,000 he had paid to attorneys to represent him in the lawsuit between him and the Association. Prior to trial, the circuit court ruled that Dr. Rao could not claim these expenses as damages in this action, given that the trial judge in the preceding action had awarded Dr. Rao attorneys' fees but found that the majority of the fees incurred were not reasonable or necessary.

The case proceeded to a nonjury trial, at which Dr. Rao asserted that the 1999 lawsuit initiated by the Association was unfounded and based upon faulty information provided by Greenacre Properties. Dr. Rao also testified about the incident in 2000 when Greenacre Properties denied him access to certain records of the Association when he requested them.[2] Regarding his damages, Dr. Rao testified that he suffered severe emotional distress as a result of the prior litigation with the Association. He asserted he missed seventeen days of work for hearings, depositions, and inspections related to the litigation, seven additional days due to rescheduling various appointments because of the demands of the lawsuit, and thirty-three hours of work for telephone conferences. Dr. Rao, who is a pediatric neurologist, testified he normally receives revenue of $275 per hour or $3000 per day.

After the trial, the circuit court entered a nineteen-page judgment that has all of the indicia of a judgment prepared by plaintiff's counsel.[3] In the judgment, the trial court concluded that Dr. Rao was a third-party beneficiary to the management contract between the Association and Greenacre Properties and that Greenacre Properties had breached the agreement. The court held that Dr. Rao was entitled to statutory damages under section 720.305 in the amount of $500. Finally, the court determined that Greenacre Properties had been negligent in fulfilling, on behalf of the Association, its duties to Dr. Rao concerning these records. The court awarded Dr. Rao $8800 in damages, representing his lost earnings or earning capacity because the earlier lawsuit between the Association and Dr. Rao had distracted Dr.

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Bluebook (online)
933 So. 2d 19, 2006 Fla. App. LEXIS 6638, 2006 WL 1154757, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/greenacre-properties-inc-v-rao-fladistctapp-2006.