Missing Contingent-Fee Term Doesn’t Doom Law Firm’s Quantum Meruit Claim

Reversing a trial court’s dismissal of a law firm’s quasi-contract claims against a former client, the First District recently considered the enforceability of a contingency fee contract that was missing a material term.

The plaintiff law firm in Seiden Law Group, P.C. v. Segal, 2021 IL App (1st) 200877 sued the defendant, an ex-client, for quantum meruit and unjust enrichment to recover the value of its fees and costs incurred in a prior lawsuit.

Key Facts

In 2013, the client defendant hired the plaintiff law firm to petition the U.S. government in Federal court for the return of personal property the government confiscated after her ex-husband’s 2004 criminal racketeering conviction.

The contingent fee contract, drafted by the plaintiff firm, was silent on the percentage of recovery that would go to the firm if the suit was successful. It read: “_____% of recovered funds…. pursuant to a forfeiture resulting from a matter concerning [defendant’s ex-husband].” The contract also provided that in the event of discharge, the firm could recover pre-firing accrued fees and expenses advanced in the lawsuit.

In 2016, the client fired the law firm. At the time of its firing, the law firm had not recovered any property on the defendant’s (then, the plaintiff’s) behalf.

The law firm then sent defendant a bill for nearly $100,000 based on its assessed value of the legal services provided to the plaintiff in the case against the government. Plaintiff sued when defendant refused to pay under quantum meruit and unjust enrichment theories of recovery.

The basis for plaintiff’s claims was that since the underlying fee agreement was unenforceable since it was missing an essential price term, it could sue alternatively for quantum meruit and unjust enrichment.

The trial court dismissed the suit. It found that the existence of an express contract – the contingency agreement – precluded the law firm’s quantum meruit and unjust enrichment claims. That the contingent-fee contract was missing a recovery percentage, did not render the contract unenforceable. The trial court noted that courts routinely supplied missing price terms in a variety of contexts. And since the contract was enforceable, it defeated plaintiff’s claims.

Reversing, the First District first noted that under Illinois law, a contract’s material terms must be definite enough so that its terms are reasonably certain and able to be determined.

Where a contract lacks a term, a court can supply one where there is a reasonable basis for it. But where the absent term is essential or so uncertain that there is no basis for deciding whether an agreement has been kept or broken, there is no contract.

Illinois courts routinely scrutinize the reasonableness of attorney fees and contingent-fee contracts to ensure that collected fees are not excessive. Illinois courts have found contingency fees ranging from 25% – 40% to be reasonable. There are even statutory benchmarks for certain fee agreements. Code Section 2-1114 (735 ILCS 5/2-1114), for example, caps contingent agreements at 33.3% of total recovery in a medical malpractice case.

However, the Court held that in an arcane case involving recovery of assets seized by the government, there is no industry standard contingent fee amount. Because of this, the Court held that the trial court could not supply a missing percentage recovery term. [19-20]

The First District also noted the contingent-fee contract ran afoul of Illinois Rule of Professional Conduct 1.5(c) which requires that contingent-fee agreements specify the method by which the fee is to be determined, and the percentage accruing to the lawyer after trial or settlement. RPC 1.5(c) [21]

The Court ultimately found that the trial court should not have dismissed the plaintiff’s quantum meruit and unjust enrichment claims.

Quantum Meruit

In Illinois, a plaintiff can sue for quantum meruit where there is no enforceable contract between the parties. But quantum meruit is not available where the underlying contract is unenforceable as a matter of public policy; such as where a contract is illegal or violates a statute. The rationale is that a party to a contract that violates public policy should not be able to circumvent the offending contract by relying on quantum meruit.

But where a contract is unenforceable for violating an ethical rule that does not involve public policy, it will not bar quantum meruit recovery.

A contract only violates public policy where it “has a tendency to injure the public welfare.”  Here, the court found the omission of the percentage recovery an “innocuous omission” that was the product of “carelessness and sloppy contract formation.”  In the Court’s view, this did not rise to the level of a public policy violation. [28]

Because the contract’s missing percentage recovery term did not implicate public policy concerns, the First District held that the law firm could assert a successful quantum meruit claim. [24]

Unjust Enrichment

The Court then considered the Plaintiff’s unjust enrichment complaint count. To state a valid unjust enrichment claim in Illinois, a plaintiff must allege (1) an enrichment, (2) an impoverishment, (3) a relation between the enrichment and impoverishment, (4) absence of justification and (5) the absence of a remedy provided by law. [31]

While similar in that they both aim to provide a plaintiff with restitution where no contract exists, quantum meruit and unjust enrichment differ in their respective recoverable damages. The former measures recovery by the reasonable value of work and material provided while the latter considers the benefit received and retained because of the improvement provided.

The Court sustained plaintiff’s unjust enrichment claim for the same reason it found plaintiff’s quantum meruit cause was prematurely dismissed.

Afterwords:

Seiden Law’s lessons are many for commercial litigators. For one, a missing contractual term cannot always be supplied by a court; especially if contract involves specialized subject matter.

The case also makes clear that a breach of RPC 1.5’s contingency fee strictures will not automatically void a contract. It is only when an ethical violation rises to the level of a public policy breach, that a court will nullify a contract.

This case also solidifies the proposition that, when faced with an unenforceable contract that does not implicate public policy concerns, a plaintiff can still bring alternative and equitable claims for quantum meruit and unjust enrichment.

 

 

The ‘Procuring Cause’ Rule – Ill. Appeals Court Weighs In

The First District recently applied the ‘procuring cause’ doctrine to award the plaintiff real estate broker a money judgment based on a reasonable brokerage commission in Jameson Real Estate, LLC v. Ahmed, 2018 IL App (1st) 171534.

The broker provided the defendant with specifics concerning an “off market” car wash business and the land it sat on. The plaintiff later gave defendant a written brokerage contract for the sale of the car wash business and property that provided for a 5% sales commission.  The defendant never signed the contract.

After many months of negotiations, defendant orally informed plaintiff he no longer wished to buy the property and stopped communicating with plaintiff.

When plaintiff later learned that defendant bought the property behind plaintiff’s back, plaintiff sued to recover his 5% commission. The trial court directed a verdict for defendant on plaintiff’s express contract claims but entered judgment for plaintiff on his quantum meruit complaint count.  The money judgment was for an amount that was congruent with what a typical buyer’s broker – splitting a commission with a selling broker – would earn in a comparable commercial sale.

Quantum meruit, which means “as much as he deserves” provides a broker plaintiff with a cause of action to recover the reasonable value of services rendered but where no express contract exists between the parties.

A quantum meruit plaintiff must plead and prove (1) it performed a service to the benefit of a defendant, (2) that it did not perform the service gratuitously, (3) the defendant accepted the plaintiff’s service, and (4) no written contract exists to prescribe payment for the service.

The fine-line distinction between quantum meruit and unjust enrichment is that in the former, the measure of recovery is the reasonable value of work and material furnished, while in the unjust enrichment setting, the focus is on the benefit received and retained as a result of the improvement provided.  [¶ 61]

In the real estate setting, a quantum meruit commission recovery can be based on either a percentage of the sales price or the amount a buyer saved by excising a broker’s fee from a given transaction. [¶ 64]

Where a real estate broker brings parties together who ultimately consummate a real estate sale, the broker is treated as the procuring cause of the completed deal. In such a case, the broker is entitled to a reasonable commission shown by the evidence. A broker can be deemed a procuring cause where he demonstrates he was involved in negotiations and in disseminating property information which leads to a completed sale. [¶ 69]

The appeals court found the trial court’s quantum meruit award of $50,000, which equaled the seller’s broker commission and which two witnesses testified was a reasonable purchaser’s broker commission, was supported by the evidence. (Note – this judgment amount was less than half of what the broker sought in his breach of express contract claim – based on the unsigned 5% commission agreement.)

The Court rejected defendant’s ‘unclean hands’ defense premised on plaintiff’s failure to publicly list the property (so he could purchase it himself) and his lag time in asserting his commission rights.

The unclean hands doctrine prevents a party from taking advantage of its own wrong.  It prevents a plaintiff from obtaining legal relief where he is guilty of misconduct in connection with the subject matter of the litigation.  For misconduct to preclude recovery, it must rise to the level of fraud or bad faith. In addition, the misconduct must be directly aimed at the party against whom relief is sought.  Conduct geared towards a third party, no matter how egregious, generally won’t support an unclean hands defense.

Here, the defendant’s allegation that the plaintiff failed to publicly list the property, even if true, wasn’t directed at the defendant.  If anything, the failure to list negatively impacted the non-party property owner, not the defendant.

Afterwords:

In the real estate broker setting, procuring cause doctrine provides a viable fall-back theory of recovery in the absence of a definite, enforceable contract.

Where a broker offers witness testimony of a customary broker commission for a similar property sale, this can serve as a sufficient evidentiary basis for a procuring cause/quantum meruit recovery.

 

Vague Oral Agreement Dooms Mechanics Lien and Home Repair Act Claims – IL First Dist.

The First District recently examined the quantum of proof necessary to prevail on a breach of oral contract and mechanics lien claim and the factors governing a plaintiff’s request to amend its pleading.

In Link Company Group, LLC v. Cortes, 2018 IL App (1st) 171785-U, the Defendant hired the plaintiff – his former son-in-law – to rehab a residence in the Northern suburbs of Chicago. After a dispute over plaintiff’s construction work and billing issues, the plaintiff sued to foreclose a mechanics lien and for breach of contract. The defendant counter-sued and alleged plaintiff violated the Illinois Home Repair and Remodeling Act (IHRRA) requires, among other things, a contractor to provide certain disclosures in writing to a homeowner client. The trial court granted summary judgment for the defendant on plaintiff’s lien and contract claims and denied summary judgment on defendant’s IHRRA counterclaim. All parties appealed.

Affirming, the appeals court first took aim at the plaintiff’s breach of contract and mechanics lien claims.

While oral contracts are generally enforceable, they must contain definite and essential terms agreed to by the parties. For an oral contract to be enforceable, it must be so definite and certain in all respects that the court can determine what the parties agreed to.

Here, the substance of the oral contract was vague. When pressed at his deposition, the plaintiff was unable to articulate the basic terms of the parties’ oral construction contract. Since the court was unable to decipher the key contract terms or divine the parties’ intent, the plaintiff’s breach of contract failed.

The plaintiff’s inability to prove-up its oral contract claim also doomed its mechanics lien action. In Illinois, a valid mechanics lien foreclosure suit requires the contractor to prove an enforceable contract and the contractor’s substantial performance of that contract. Since the plaintiff failed to establish a binding oral contract, by definition, it couldn’t prevail on its mechanics lien claim.

The First District also affirmed the trial court’s denial of the plaintiff’s motion to amend its complaint. While amendments to pleadings are generally liberally allowed in Illinois, a court will not rubber stamp a request to amend. Instead, the court engages in a multi-factored analysis of (1) whether the proposed amendment would cure the defective pleading, (2) whether other parties would sustain prejudice by virtue of the proposed amendment, (3) whether the proposed amendment is timely, and (4) whether previous opportunities to amend the pleadings could be identified.

Here, the plaintiff’s proposed implied-in-fact contract was “nearly identical” to the stricken breach of oral contract claim. An implied-in-fact contract is one where contract terms are implicit from the parties’ conduct. Here, the parties conduct was too attenuated to establish definite contract terms. As a result, the proposed implied-in-law contract claim was facially deficient and didn’t cure the earlier, failed pleading.

Ironically, the plaintiff’s failure to allege an enforceable oral agreement also precluded summary judgment on the defendant’s IHRRA counterclaim. A valid IHRRA claim presupposes the existence of an enforceable contract. Since there was no written agreement and the parties’ oral agreement was unclear, there was no valid contract on which to hook an IHRRA violation.

Afterwords:

This case cements proposition that a valid oral contract claim requires proof of definite and certain terms. A plaintiff’s failure to allege a clear and definite oral agreement will prevent him from asserting either a mechanics lien or Home Repair Act claim based on the putative oral agreement.

Link Company also illustrates the four factors a litigant must satisfy in order to amend a pleading. If the proposed amended complaint fails to allege a colorable cause of action, a court can properly deny leave to amend despite Illinois’ liberal pleading amendments policy.