Owner Entitled to Back Rent, Not Future Rent

A restaurant tenant didn't pay its rent. The owner waited eight months after the first rent payment became due to demand payment. The tenant paid one month's rent, but missed the next month's rent payment. The owner then canceled the lease and locked the tenant out. The owner sued the tenant for both back rent and future rent. The tenant argued that the owner had waived—that is, given up—its right to back rent by telling the tenant's wife that the back rent would be forgiven. And the owner wasn't entitled to collect future rent.

An Iowa appeals court ruled that the owner hadn't waived its right to collect back rent, but it wasn't entitled to collect future rent. The lease required that a waiver of back rent be in writing. But the tenant couldn't prove that the owner had signed a waiver (nor did his wife's testimony prove that the owner intended to waive the back rent). As for future rent, the court said that the owner's “act of forfeiting and canceling the lease and evicting” the tenant relieved the tenant of liability for future rent [J.L. Hollen, LLC v. Landergott].