FIRST UNION NATIONAL BANK OF FLORIDA AND SEA LAND CONTRACTORS, INC., A FLORIDA CORPORATION, APPELLANTS,
v.
2800 S.E. DUNE DRIVE CONDOMINIUM ASSOCIATION, INC., A FLORIDA NOT-FOR-PROFIT CORPORATION, APPELLEE
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
Florida appellate court reversed an award of attorney's fees to a condominium association against a contractor, holding that a contractual fee-shifting clause tied to contractor performance does not authorize fees for preliminary litigation over a letter of credit until the underlying performance dispute is resolved.
A contractual provision requiring a contractor to reimburse attorney's fees incurred "by reason of Contractor's failure to perform" does not authorize an award of fees for letter of credit litigation until the underlying performance dispute is concluded.
[1] A contractual provision requiring reimbursement of attorney's fees incurred "by reason of" a contractor's failure to perform does not authorize an award of fees for colla…
Previewing 1 of 1 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceSea Land, a contractor hired to make repairs, and the property owner (condominium association) disputed performance. When the contractor attempted to …
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
Explore caselaw by topic → Browse Attorney'S Fees Provision cases and more on FLexlaw
KLEIN, Judge.
Appellant Sea Land, a contractor, appeals an adverse judgment for attorney’s fees based on a provision in its contract with appellee owner which provided:
Contractor shall reimburse Association for reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs including such fees and costs for any proceeding, trial or appeal, incurred by reason of Contractor’s failure to perform under this Contract or any part thereof.
A dispute arose between the owner of the property and the contractor who had been hired to make certain repairs. When the contractor attempted to draw on a letter of credit, which secured partial payment for the construction, the owner filed for an injunction and sought declaratory relief. The owner was successful in its action and the trial court awarded attorney’s fees under the above quoted provision. The parties are still involved in a lawsuit in which one of the issues is whether the contractor properly completed performance of its contract.
We conclude that the contractual provision for attorney’s fees, which was the only basis for the award, does not authorize the award of attorney’s fees for the letter of credit litigation at this time. We therefore reverse without prejudice to the owner seeking these attorney’s fees after the conclusion of the litigation involving the contractor’s performance under the contract.
POLEN and PARIENTE, JJ. concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
-
Capron Trail Cmty. Dev. Dist. v. Frenz Enters., Inc., 674 So. 2d 875 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996)…ees, pursuant to the above contract provision, until the outcome of the arbitration is known. Although somewhat differently factually, we find our prior opinion in First Union National Bank of Florida v. 2800 S.E. Dune Drive Condominium Association, 661 So. 2d 955 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995), to be instructive in this regard. In First Union, a contractor sought to draw on a letter of credit seeking partial payment for construction. However, the owner prevailed in its action seeking an injunction and declaratory reli…