Opinion ID: 1589927
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Properly Terminated

Text: Section 18-16-105 provides: The owner of farmlands which are leased under an oral agreement may elect not to renew the oral rental or lease agreement for the following calendar year by giving written notice by certified registered mail to the renter or lessee, on or before June 30, that the lease or rental agreement will not be renewed for the following calendar year. In Steele v. Murphy, 279 Ark. 235, 650 S.W.2d 573 (1983), this court held that the General Assembly intended that section 18-16-105 (previously codified as Ark. Stat. Ann. § 50-531 (Supp.1981)) be applied to tenancies from year to year. This court explained that, at common law, a tenant from year to year was entitled to six months' notice to vacate, and, by supplying the date in section 18-16-105, the General Assembly had given landlords and tenants a clear, simple and codified method of giving six months' notice as applied to tenancies from year to year. Id. at 237, 650 S.W.2d at 574. Moreover, while oral notice, if timely given, has always been sufficient notice, section 18-16-105 provides that the landlord may elect to use this form of written notice. Id. at 238, 650 S.W.2d at 574. As stated above, Seidenstricker Farms was a year-to-year tenant. Consequently, the Dosses were required to give notice of termination, written or otherwise, on or before June 30, 2001. They did not do this. Therefore, the lease was not properly terminated. Furthermore, and despite the dissent's analysis, this court's holding in Lamew, 147 Ark. 282, 227 S.W. 593, does not control the outcome of this case. There, a contract was entered into between the parties, which included the following condition: the lease is for a period of one year, with the option to continue from time to time as long as conditions are satisfactory to both parties[.] Id. at 284, 227 S.W. at 594. After examining the lease and the conduct of the parties, this court held: [T]he effect of this contract and the actions of the parties under it would have been to create a tenancy from year to year if there had been no language in the contract to indicate a contrary purpose. But we must give some effect to the provision of the contract that it is to continue from time to time so long as conditions are satisfactory to both parties hereto. Id. at 286, 227 S.W. at 594. This court held that the parties contemplated that the tenancy might continue for longer than a year, but that the continuance was conditional upon it remaining mutually satisfactory. Id. Thus, it was this court's duty to give the contract the effect intended by the parties. Id. In so doing, this court held that the parties had the right to mutually reserve the right to waive the common-law requirement of six-months' notice if either party became dissatisfied, but that each party was entitled to reasonable notice from the other of an intent to terminate the contract. Id. This case is distinguishable. In this case, the 1993 lease gave an explicit period of time for which the lease was to govern. Specifically, it stated: TO HAVE AND TO HOLD unto said TENANT from the date of January 1, 1993, until the first of January 1994, provided it satisfactory with both parties. There is nothing within this provision that indicates, as the Lamew lease did, that the parties contemplated the continuation of the lease for more than one year if the arrangement remained mutually satisfactory to the parties. Rather, the satisfactory language used in the 1993 lease related solely to the one-year lease term. See Unigard Sec. Ins. Co. v. Murphy Oil USA, Inc. 331 Ark. 211, 962 S.W.2d 735 (1998) (holding that we give the words in a contract their obvious meaning). To hold otherwise would require this court to read into the contract words that are not there, which we will not do. See Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Archer, 356 Ark. 136, 147 S.W.3d 681 (2004) (explaining that this court will not read language into a contract that is simply not there). Moreover, the dissent incorrectly concludes that the language of the lease here contemplates that the parties could cut short the one-year lease period at anytime during a lease term. While it is true it is our duty to give the contract the effect intended by parties, there is nothing within the lease regarding termination, early or otherwise. Rather, the lease solely contemplated renewal by giving notification ninety days prior to the expiration of the lease, and as stated earlier, that renewal provision was essentially waived by the parties' conduct since the expiration of the original 1993 lease term. Consequently, Lamew does not control this case and the Dosses were required to give notice of termination in compliance with section 18-16-105. Therefore, the circuit court erred in finding that the lease was properly terminated and dismissing the case. [5] We reverse and remand the case to the circuit court for proceedings on the issue of damages, if any. Reversed and remanded. BROWN and IMBER, JJ., dissent.