Farm Lease Termination – The Impact of Not Specifying the Correct Termination Date

January 10, 2010 | Erin Herbold

Here, the parties entered into a written farm lease of 252 acres for a one-year term. Though the written lease specified a one-year term, the tenant continued to farm the land for the following two crop years. On Aug. 6, 2008, the landlord served notice of termination on the tenant that his tenancy would terminate at the end of the calendar year. The tenant replied by letter, stating that the landlord had not complied with the requirements of Iowa Code §562.5, which requires that the date of termination of a farm lease be specified as March 1 of the following year. 

The landlord filed a petition with the trial court, asking for a determination that the letter constituted a valid farm lease termination. The court granted the petition and the tenant appealed.  

On appeal, the court went through the requirements set out by Iowa Code §§ 562.5-.7.  Included in those provisions is the requirement that the notice must fix the termination on the first day of March.  The landlord did comply with each of the statutory procedures for providing the notice of termination. Even though the termination date was improperly set at the end of the calendar year, the tenant was still on notice that the lease would be terminated for the following crop year. That being said, the tenant is entitled to possession of the property until March 1, as is required by the Iowa Code. The appellate court acknowledged that the plain language of the code requires the date be fixed on March 1.  However, the Code does not address how to deal with an improper date for termination being given. But, this issue has come up in other jurisdictions and the courts simply do not allow a tenant to prevail.  Foster v. Schwickerath, 780 N.W.2d 746 (Iowa Ct. App. 2009).