Bernardo Villas Management Corp. v. Black

Opinion

WIENER, J.

Plaintiff Bernardo Villas Management Corporation Number Two (Bernardo Villas Management) appeals from the judgment in favor of defendants Mary Black and Kenneth Trout. We affirm.

Mary Black and Kenneth Trout lived in a condominium managed by Bernardo Villas Management. The condominium was subject to a declaration of covenants and restrictions which included: “No truck, camper, trailer, boat of any kind or other form of recreational vehicle shall be parked on the [Bernardo] Villas 6 project, except temporarily and solely for the purposes of loading and unloading, without the prior approval of the Architectural Committee____The carports shall be used for parking of passenger automobiles or non-powered vehicles such as bicycles, only----”

In February 1985 Trout bought a new pickup which he parked in the carport for Black’s condominium. Bernardo Villas Management sued to enjoin him and Black from parking the pickup in the carport and to recover $2,060 in fines it had imposed for violating the condominium restriction.

A condominium project may impose covenants and restrictions on the use or enjoyment of any portion of the common interest area. (Civ. Code, § 1353.) These covenants and restrictions become equitable servitudes, unless unreasonable. (Civ. Code, § 1354.) Here, the trial court properly found the restriction unreasonable as applied to clean noncommercial pickup trucks. The court correctly concluded the parking of such vehicles in condominium carports was not aesthetically unpleasant to reasonable

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persons and did not interfere with other owners’ use and enjoyment of their property. None of the cases relied on by Bernardo Villas Management (see

Ritchey

v.

Villa Nueva Condominium Ass'n

(1978) 81 Cal.App.3d 688 [146 Cal.Rptr. 695, 100 A.L.R.3d 231],

Flowers

v.

John Burnham & Co.