Aviel

The commercial lease pertinent to this appeal was extinguished by a trustee’s sale under a deed of trust. The deed of trust was senior to the lease by virtue of a clause in the lease subordinating it to future mortgages. In this appeal from a judgment, after summary adjudication and court and jury trials, appellants, the former lessees of the foreclosed property, continue to assert that the lease was not forfeited because the subordination clause encompassed only mortgages, not deeds of trust. As we explain, under long-settled legal precedent the two instruments are functionally and legally the same. Appellants also assert that the trial court awarded damages to respondents for appellants’ postforeclosure occupancy of the premises on an improper basis. We conclude the damage award was appropriate. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment in its entirety.

I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

In September 1998, the Ngs entered into a commercial lease with Don Junkin for the basement suite of 415 Grand Avenue, South San Francisco, for the purpose of operating a restaurant called the Grand Palace Restaurant. It was a six-year lease with three five-year renewal options. Monthly rent began at…