Court Ruling on Rent Suspension During Health Crisis

Extract

[...] - As a result, the rent suspension clause was not applicable either, since only facts of disorder affecting the property or taken over by insurance, which is not the case in the present case. SCOPE: confirm the position of the Court in the judgment of 30 June 2022, reminding that even in a period of crisis, the tenant cannot unilaterally suspend the payment of rent. - An interdiction to operate a business does not equate to a loss of the rented thing and does not exempt from paying the rent. [...]

[...] - The Court had already said before that force majeure did not allow one to be discharged from the obligation and if one relied solely on force majeure, the service provider was right, but the Court gives a very general decision and reproaches the Court of Appeal for not having verified whether there was a failure to perform the contract, so it is always necessary to verify with the contract whether there was a contractual non-performance. =decision quite justified. - Restitution, as the contract could not be executed. VI. [...]

[...] - One might have feared here that the movement would be unstoppable. The Court of Cassation puts a welcome stop to it by ruling thatoverflowing with the right to grant presumptions of loss in the matter of non-performance of the lease contract, which remains governed by the classical principles of civil liability, which require the victim to demonstrate not only the existence of a fault, but also of a loss resulting from it. The landlord's property right cannot justify that the damage caused by the tenant justifies compensation in itself. [...]

[...] Court of Cassation, Civil Chamber March No. 21-24.783; Civil Chamber June No. 22-10.298; June No. 21-20.190; November No. 21-21.867; November No. 22-12.753; Article 1735 of the Draft Reform of Special Contracts of July 2022 - Lease: obligations of the tenant - Case summaries SPECIAL CONTRACTS LAW - SESSION N°5 - LEASE - OBLIGATIONS OF THE TENANT I. DOC 1 - C. [...]

[...] - However, following the publication, due to the health crisis related to COVID 19, of a prefectural decree setting, for family events, a maximum capacity of thirty people. PROCEDURES : This motivates the applicant to request the resolution of the contract and the restitution of his deposit by invoking the existence of an act of God, to which the company responds in reconvention, the payment of an amount corresponding to the balance of the rental. COURT OF APPEAL DECISION : The court of appeal decision rejects the applicant's entire set of demands and holds that if this ordinance imposed constraints on the company, they did not make the execution of the contract impossible, provided that reception remained possible within the limit of 30 people. [...]