Rhode Island Hospital Trust Bank v. Coastal Winds South, Inc.

STONE, Judge.

This is an appeal from a judgment holding the rent escalation provisions of a ninety-nine-year lease to be unconscionable. The trial court granted relief to the plaintiff cooperative association by declaring all present and future rent escalations to be void. The lease has been in effect for over twenty years.

The trial court fixed future rent at a specified permanent figure. The court additionally reduced the overall term of the lease from ninety-nine to fifty years, and declared that the fee simple ownership interest of the lessor be transferred without compensation to the…