47-05 Ctr. SPE L.L.C. v. Hack, 2025 NY Slip Op 25129 (2025)

Citation: 47-05 Ctr. SPE L.L.C. v. Hack, 2025 NY Slip Op 25129 (2025)
Parent Document: 47-05 Ctr. SPE L.L.C. v. Hack, 2025 NY Slip Op 25129 (2025)
Jurisdiction: New York (state)
Effective Date: 2025-05-28
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/10594925/47-05-ctr-spe-llc-v-hack/ ↗

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To be clear, the authentication of a lease as a business record is not premised on the business records exception to the rule against consideration of hearsay. A lease, as with other contracts, is not an out of court statement but rather "a verbal act [that has a] legal reality independent of the truth of any statement contained in it" where the rules pertaining to the use of hearsay have no application (id. at n1 [internal citation and quotation omitted]; see also Service Alliance v Betesh, 52 Misc 3d 131 [App Term, 2d Dept, 2d, 11th & 13th Jud Dists 2016]). Rather, admission of a lease on the basis of its constituting a business record appears to be derived from the common sense conclusion that, where a landlord or its agent testifies that it is its regular business practice to execute a lease prior to conveying possession to a tenant or upon expiration of the preceding lease, and where the landlord has in its custody a fully executed lease maintained in the ordinary course of its business and bearing the name of the same individual who is presently in actual possession of the demised premises, the overwhelming circumstantial evidence usually points to such a lease being "what it purports to be," namely a genuine contract (DeLeon v Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, 306 AD2d 146 [1st Dept 2003]). The respondent in such a scenario can, of course, testify in rebuttal that his signature on the lease is a forgery. If unrebutted, such testimony could well undermine the weight of the lease as evidence of a binding contract; however, such a theoretical concern is more appropriately treated as an affirmative defense than a threshold bar to the lease's consideration as evidence by the court.

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