Baird v. Knutzen
| Decision Date | 06 September 1956 |
| Docket Number | No. 33634,33634 |
| Citation | 301 P.2d 375,49 Wn.2d 308 |
| Court | Washington Supreme Court |
| Parties | B. T. BAIRD and Rose Marie Baird, his wife, Respondents, v. A. P. KNUTZEN, Appellant, G. S. Williams and Laura A. Williams, his wife, Respondents. |
R. W. Greene and David E. Rhea, Bellingham, for appellant.
No appearance for respondents.
The defendants Knutzen owned eighty acres of timberland near Lake Whatcom. In order to log it, they needed an easement over plaintiffs' abutting land. In 1949, they entered into an acknowledged agreement by which plaintiffs granted them a logging right-of-way easement for a period of eight years, for which they agreed to pay fifty dollars a year rental and, after three years, to convey the eighty acres to plaintiffs by a warranty deed. They paid the first year's rental and no more. On two occasions, plaintiffs called them on the telephone and demanded the rental for the second year.
In 1951, plaintiffs had the written agreement recorded. In 1952, they went to see defendants Knutzens' attorney regarding the promised warranty deed to the eighty acres, but to no avail.
In 1953, the plaintiffs but a 'Private Property' sign on the right of way, because they were going to California for a month and other parties were attempting to use the road.
In June, 1953, defendants Knutzen, in violation of the agreement, conveyed the eighty acres in question by warranty deed to defendants Williams. Mrs. Elida Knutzen died March 30, 1954.
The plaintiffs brought this action against defendants Knutzen and their grantees, the Williamses, for specific performance of the contract to convey the eighty acres to them. The defendants Williams, in their answer to plaintiffs' complaint, sought to quiet title to the land in themselves and, in a cross-complaint against Knutzen, sought damages if specific performance were granted the plaintiffs.
(1) The court decreed that the Williams' title was null and void ab initio and ordered defendant Knutzen to convey the eighty acres to the plaintiffs by warranty deed. (2) It gave defendants Williams a money judgment against Knutzen in the amount of the purchase price they had paid him for the land and costs.
The defendant Knutzen appeals from both judgments.
The appellant has made four assignments of error against the findings of fact made by the trial court, five against its conclusions of law, seven against the court's refusal to make appellant's requested findings of fact, and three against the trial court's refusal to make appellant's requested conclusions of law. We find that the record supports the trial court as to each of these assignments of error.
The appellant assigns as error the admission in evidence of a copy of a letter written by respondents Bairds' attorney to the appellant without first making a demand to produce the original. In it the respondents demanded the accrued rental as provided for in the written agreement. The admission of the attorney's copy without a prior demand for the original was...
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Berg v. Ting
...the subsequent purchasers have notice of the rights of another under a contract conveying an interest in land. Baird v. Knutzen, 49 Wash.2d 308, 311, 301 P.2d 375 (1956). A significant question in this case, therefore, is whether the Tings are bona fide purchasers for value; if so, specific......
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Porter v. Boisso
...for declaratory relief and specific performance, a number of Washington cases support Mr. Porter's position. In Baird v. Knutzen, 49 Wash.2d 308, 310, 301 P.2d 375 (1956), the Bairds had granted a three-year logging easement to the Knutzens in exchange for an annual rental and an agreement ......
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Dolske v. Gormley
...so as to be inconsistent with the rights of the dominant owner. (Brearton v. Fina, 3 Misc.2d 1, 8, 155 N.Y.S.2d 399; Baird v. Knutzen, 49 Wash.2d 308, 310-311, 301 P.2d 375; see McCoy v. Matich, 128 Cal.App.2d 50, 53, 274 P.2d 714.) The trial court's finding of no unreasonable restriction b......
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Bartlett v. Parman
... ... that the nonclaim statute does not apply to a person filing a ... claim on their own community property interest); Baird v ... Knutzen , 49 Wn.2d 308, 310, 301 P.2d 375 (1956) ... ("An action for specific performance of a contract is ... not within ... ...