Laravel: Get single model using pivot table with where clause

Question

I've got 3 tables:

Car: belongsToMany Owner
Owner: belongsToMany Car
CarOwner: pivot table for Car and Owner with an additional column 'active' that indicates who is the current Owner of a Car

So a Car might have multiple or no Owners and vica versa BUT a Car has only 1 current ('active') Owner.

class Car extends Model
{
    use HasFactory;
    
    public function owners()
    {
        return $this->belongsToMany(Owner::class, 'car_owners');
    }

    public function currentOwner()
    {
        return $this->owners()->where('active', true)->first();
    }
}

My problem is if a Car has no active Owner, Laravel throws the following exception when I want to use $car->currentOwner in a Blade template:

App\Models\Car::currentOwner must return a relationship instance, but "null" was returned. Was the "return" keyword used?

How can I handle if a Car doesn't have any active Owners?

Gert B. · Accepted Answer · 2021-01-14 07:44:54Z

1

You can create a custom attribute instead of a relation function:

    public function getCurrentOwnerAttribute()
    {
        return $this->owners()->where('active', true)->first();
    }

answered Jan 14, 2021 at 7:44

Gert B.

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3 Comments

jeti Over a year ago

I'm using the same line in my currentOwner() function. :)

Gert B. Over a year ago

@flow3r your function is different. by using "public function currentOwner()" you set a relation, "public function getCurrentOwnerAttribute()" creates a custom attribute. that you can call by using $car->currentOwner. laravel.com/docs/8.x/eloquent-mutators#defining-a-mutator

jeti Over a year ago

I'm sorry, I didn't know the difference between our function declarations, I'm new to Laravel. But your solution works, thanks!

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