San Diego Real Estate Litigation Lawyer

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Real Estate Litigation

Contract disputes
Easement/boundary disputes
Foreclosure litigation
Lease disputes
Lender disputes
Partnership/shareholder/investor disputes

Mazzarella Law APC is uniquely qualified to represent clients in a broad range of real estate disputes. Mark Mazzarella founded the firm in 1991, after leaving the largest real estate firm in California where he was Chairman of the trial department for its San Diego office. Over the next 26 years, the firm has represented many of San Diego’s most prominent real estate developers, real estate professionals, and private and institutional land owners.

In addition to being recognized as one of the best business litigators in San Diego, Mark Mazzarella has been listed in “The Best Of The U.S.” in the real estate lawyer category every year the list has existed; some years as the only trial lawyer in San Diego who received that distinction. He knows the real estate business from both the legal and business perspective. While practicing law full-time, Mark Mazzarella has also been a licensed real estate broker and a principal in entities which have developed or renovated over 1100 apartment and condominium/loft units. His practical experience in the real estate business, coupled with decades of successfully representing the most demanding clients with real estate disputes, makes him uniquely qualified.

When Daral Mazzarella joined the firm in 2014, as a trial lawyer for 31 years and a general contractor licensed by the State of California for the past 40 years, he brought a new dimension to the firm. After practicing for 12 years with the largest “plaintiffs firm” in San Diego, where he was the managing partner, Daral ran his own firm for another 16 years before joining Mazzarella Law APC. Like Mark, Daral Mazzarella has been recognized year after year by his peers as one of the best trial lawyers in San Diego, but in addition to receiving such recognition in the “Business Litigation” category, Daral also has been named in polls of his peers in the “Construction Litigation” category. He is intimately familiar with building codes, the practices of building trades, and the construction process from grading to application of final finishes. No attorney in California is better qualified to represent clients who are involved in construction disputes.

Mark and Daral Mazzarella, together with the other talented attorneys and staff at Mazzarella Law APC, provide real estate clients with unequalled expertise, experience, case management and a reputation for trying and winning real estate cases for both plaintiffs and defendants. As reflected in the “Representative Cases” listed below, frequently, the firm has successfully defended suits against the firm’s clients, while recovering damages for the firm’s clients against those who sued them.

REPRESENTATIVE CASES

In a jury trial the firm obtained a $3,000,000 verdict in favor of the firm’s real estate developer client for wrongful foreclosure against a Canadian Real Estate Trust, while successfully defending a cross-complaint for breach of fiduciary duty by the Canadian Trust in which the Canadian Trust sought to recover damages in excess of $10,000,000 from the firm’s client.
Several years later the same Canadian Real Estate Trust retained the firm to represent it in a law suit against a different real estate developer, in which the firm recovered $1.8 million dollars for the Canadian Trust.
In a jury trial of another foreclosure case, the firm obtained a defense verdict on the lender’s complaint which sought to recover $2.5 million from the firm’s real estate developer’s client on his guarantee, and won a $3.5 million verdict in favor of its client against the lender for fraud and wrongful foreclosure.
In a dispute between a tenant which held a lease from the Port of San Diego for Bayfront property in Point Loma, and the firm’s developer client who sought to build condos on the leasehold, in a jury trial the firm received a defense verdict on the opposing party’s multi-million dollar claim, and a verdict in excess of $1 million in favor of the firm’s client on his claim.
The firm represented the head of an Orange County based real estate development firm in a suit filed against him by his partner who sought to recover 8-figure damages in connection with the disposition of the firm’s 30 office, commercial and industrial properties. After a long trial, the jury returned a defense verdict in favor of the firm’s client on the Plaintiff’s complaint, while awarding in excess of $500,000 to our client on his cross-complaint for unpaid capital contributions by the Plaintiff.
The firm recovered a judgment of $2.8 million on behalf of the owner of a bar/restaurant in the Gaslamp against its landlord for breach of the lease and fraud. The jury rendered a verdict in our client’s favor on the landlord’s $2 million claim for unpaid rent and other damages.
We obtained a $27 million judgment in favor of our client, a large national bank which sued the developer of a golf course in Colorado on his personal guarantee.
We have sued internationally branded hotel management companies on behalf of the owners of full service hotel owners which resulted in settlements for the firm’s clients valued at $70 million and $50 million.
In a jury trial, the firm obtained a $7.8 million verdict against one of the world’s largest engineering firms on behalf of a venture capital firm that sought approval of a $375 million expansion of the Brown Field Airport into a large commercial cargo airport, after the City of San Diego terminated our client’s Exclusive Negotiating Agreement due to numerous mistakes made by the consulting firm. Before trial, the firm also obtained a $1.5 million settlement from the City.
In addition to the $1.5 million in damages recovered from the City of San Diego in the Brown Field case, the firm has recovered damages on behalf of our developer clients of $5,000,000, $2.2 million, $800,000 and $300,000 in separate actions for the breach of Exclusive Negotiating Agreements by The San Diego Unified Port District, The City of Oceanside, The City of Chula Vista and The County of San Diego.
In two separate trials, including a high profile trial on behalf of a former San Diego City Attorney, we obtained title to real property based on adverse possession. In other trials, we have established easements “by prescription” and “by necessity.”