Ranch at the Falls v. Indian Springs Homeowners Assn. CA2/8

FACTS

In 1998, defendant recorded a declaration of easement in favor of abutting landowners, including plaintiffs, and so did the homeowners association in neighboring Indian Falls (the 1998 easement declarations). The parties to this lawsuit disagreed over the scope of those easements.

2 Contemporaneously with the 1998 easement declarations, defendant and the Indian Falls homeowners association also made “Easement and Maintenance Agreement[s]” with each other. In these “maintenance agreements,” each homeowners association gave the other, and abutting property owners, right of way easements over and across the same streets as the two easement declarations, to create a direct path through the respective projects for ingress and egress. These maintenance agreements contained a clause entitling the prevailing party to attorney fees, “[i]f any action at law or in equity is necessary to enforce or interpret the terms of this Agreement . . . .” Just before the trial on the merits of this lawsuit, plaintiffs filed an ex parte motion to amend their complaint to assert a claim for attorney fees based on the 1998 maintenance agreements. The trial court denied the ex parte motion, but…