Hooper v. Young

California Court of Appeal May 15, 1909 No. Civ. No. 580.Published

Before: Hall

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Holding. The court held that a party who advances purchase money for land and retains legal title while granting a bond for a deed acts as a vendor rather than merely a mortgagee; therefore, the vendee's failure to pay the debt does not divest the vendor of title, and the vendor may maintain ejectment against a vendee who repudiates the contract.

Issues

Whether a grantee who advances purchase money and retains legal title holds the rights of a mortgagee or a vendor.
Whether the statute of limitations on a purchase-money note divests the vendor of legal title.
Whether a vendee who repudiates a contract of sale can maintain possession against the holder of the legal title.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“The deed from Shanklin to Swain conveyed to Swain the entire legal title held by Shanklin. Of this title Swain and his grantee Webber have never been divested.”

“A vendee under a contract to sell does not obtain title by the outlawing of his contract to purchase, or of his promise to pay the purchase price.”

“The defendant having by his answer repudiated the contract, and having refused to pay the balance due, the plaintiff can maintain the present action to recover possession.”

Synopsis

Ejectment—Plaintiffs Claiming as Vendees of Mortgagor—Outlawed Debt—Title Held by Vendor as Security.—Where plaintiffs in ejectment claim to be the successors in interest of a mortgagor whose debt is outlawed, and which they repudiate, claiming to be holders of the legal title, but it appears in fact that the vendor retained the legal title as security for the debt, and that one of the defendants is the successor in interest of such title and the codefendant is a tenant of such defendant, the plaintiffs are not entitled to recover the possession of the property.

Id.—Payment of Debt Essential to Obtain Deed of Vendor’s Title. In such case the payment of the debt by the purchaser or his grantees was essential to obtain a conveyance of the title from the vendor or Ms grantee.

Id.—Effect of Outlawed Debt—Vendor’s Title Unaffected.—The outlawing of the debt for wMch the purchaser was responsible cannot affect the legal title remaining in the vendor, nor operate to transfer the same to the purchaser.

Id.—Effect of Bepudiation of Debt—Loss of Equities.—When - the purchaser and his grantees have refused to pay the debt and have repudiated the same, they are neither entitled to recover the possession from the vendor or Ms grantee, nor to enforce any equities against such grantee, their equitable estate having been divested by such repudiation, and they have no equities that ought to prevail against the legal title.

Id.—Improper Judgment for Plaintiffs—New Trial Properly Granted.—When the court had improperly rendered judgment for plaintiff on the theory that the transaction was a mere mortgage, it properly granted a new trial to the defendants.

HALL, J.

This is an appeal from an order granting defendants a new trial. "

The action is in ejectment for the recovery of a tract of land containing about forty acres, situated in the city and county of San Francisco. The original plaintiffs were C. A. Hooper and T. M. Osmont, but Osmont having died since the trial the other plaintiffs were substituted. Defendant Young is simply a tenant of defendant Webber.

This is the second appeal in this case. Upon the first appeal plaintiffs claimed title under a patent to one Wagner, which was held void, while defendants claimed title under a patent to one Weaver.

(Hooper

Young,

140 Cal. 274, [98 Am. St. Rep. 56, 74 Pac. 140].)

The Weaver title on the fourteenth day of January, 1873, was vested in one J. W. Shanklin, who on that day conveyed, for the named consideration of $1,500, to Wm. B. Swain. This deed was duly recorded on the same day. Swain conveyed to Webber by gift deed dated and duly recorded December 22, 1892.

On the first trial plaintiffs also claimed that the deed from Shanklin to Swain was a mortgage to secure $700, loaned by

[592]

Swain to Meeks, with which to in part purchase the property, and that as the debt had long since outlawed, defendants could claim nothing under such deed. The court did not pass upon this claim that the deed to Swain was a mortgage, but held “That as the admissions and presumptions in the ease, even on plaintiff’s theory that the deed to Swain was a mortgage, show that the defendant Webber, as successor to all the rights of Swain, is in possession of the premises as mortgagee, the finding of the court that the plaintiffs were entitled to the possession of said premises is not sustained, but is contrary to the evidence.”

The controlling facts in the case are as follows:

On January 14, 1873, J. W. Shanklin was seised in fee of the premises in suit, and one Meeks desired to purchase the same. Swain paid $700 to Shanklin, and took a deed for the premises. Whether the other $800 was paid by Meeks does not clearly appear. Swain took a promissory note from Meeks for the $700, and interest at two per cent per month, and executed to Meeks an instrument whereby he agreed to convey the land to Meeks on the payment of the $700 and interest, in accordance with said note. The note by its terms was due July 14, 1873.

Hooper v. Young

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Synopsis

HALL, J.

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