Buckner v. Jones

• Decision Date: 05 December 1930
• Docket Number: 20.
• Citation: Buckner v. Jones, 159 Md. 679, 152 A. 515 (Md. 1930)
• Parties: BUCKNER ET AL. v. JONES ET UX.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

152 A. 515

159 Md. 679

BUCKNER ET AL. v. JONES ET UX.

No. 20.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

December 5, 1930

Appeal from Circuit CourtNo. 2 of Baltimore City; Samuel K. Dennis Judge.

Suit by Stanley Jones and wife against Alexander A. Buckner and others.Decree for complainants, and defendants appeal.

Affirmed.

Argued before PATTISON, URNER, ADKINS, OFFUTT, DIGGES, PARKE, and SLOAN, JJ.

David Ash, of Baltimore (Louis Hollander, of Baltimore on the brief), for appellants.

Edwin T. Dickerson and Leon I. Kappelman, both of Baltimore (Samuel H. Hoffberger, of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellees.

OFFUTT J.

In 1919Stanley Jones and Eliza, his wife, colored, were living in Baltimore.Stanley, who was employed as a truck driver by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company, was also a minister of the gospel, and to augment his earnings occasionally conducted religious services as time and occasion permitted, and Eliza his wife, contributed to the family exchequer her earnings as a domestic servant.They were a simple unsophisticated couple, absorbed in their own small problems and ambitions and wholly unconscious of any necessity for caution in dealing with strangers in business affairs.Stanley, although he was a minister of the gospel, had no church in which to preach it, and one of their ambitions was to secure some building in which he might conduct religious services, and in furtherance of that hope they were looking for a house which could be used both as a church and a dwelling.With that end in mind, on March 5, 1919 at the suggestion of John Edwards a member and a deacon pro tem of Stanley's congregation, Stanley approached Louis Buckner, a real estate operator who owned a number of houses in Baltimore city, to learn whether he had such a house as they wanted.Buckner had for many years been engaged in buying, selling, and dealing in real estate apparently as his principal occupation, and the impression left by his testimony is that he is a shrewd capable and experienced business man, thoroughly familiar with the technique of the real estate business.As a result of his interview with Buckner, Jones and his wife occupied a house known as No. 405 South Bond street in Baltimore city, which was subject to a ground rent of $30.37, and which had been purchased for $2,500 in 1918 and conveyed to Louis Buckner's son Alexander A. Buckner and Elsya his wife, and which at the time of the interview stood in their names, as indeed it still does.

The terms upon which they occupied the property constitute the issue in this case.Jones and his wife, the appellants, assert that they entered it under a parole agreement of purchase, which provided that it was to be sold to them for $5,000, payable in monthly installments, and that, upon the payment of that sum, with accrued interest, taxes, and other incidental expenses, it would be granted to them by a proper conveyance.Buckner's contention, on the other hand, appears to be that they occupied the property as mere monthly tenants, and that he never at any time, either for himself or for his son and daughter-in-law, contracted to sell it to them.But whether as tenants or as purchasers from the time they entered the property in March, 1919, until some time in 1926 Jones and his wife did make monthly payments to the Buckners, aggregating, according to their testimony, over $7,000, and, according to the appellants' testimony, $5,982.30.

In September, 1926, Jones apparently began to be uneasy about his interest and title to the property in which he had invested his earnings for so long, and a paper which Louis Buckner presented to him at or about that time to be signed by himself and his wife confirmed his fears and suspicions.That paper was in the form of a contract for the purchase of the property for $8,000.Jones, to quote from his testimony, "didn't see nothing that belonged to" him on that paper, and, when Buckner said that it was all right, he said, "No sir, it is alright for you but I don't see nothing on there for me," and refused to sign it.After that interview, since the appellants definitely refused to recognize any contract for the sale of the property to appellees, they made no further payments on it, and in October, 1926, they filed the original bill of complaint in this case against Alexander A. Buckner and Elsya, his wife, in circuit courtNo. 2 of Baltimore City.The defendants answered that bill, the case was referred to an auditor for accounting, the parties adduced evidence before the auditor supporting their respective contentions, and the auditor reported to the court that he had found that the complainants had made payments on account of the property aggregating above all allowances and deductions $5,337.34.The case was then heard on bill, answer, and testimony before the chancellor, who decreed that the defendants had made a valid and enforceable contract for the sale of the property to the complainants, but, inasmuch as the auditor had failed to compute interest on the deferred payments, the case was again referred to him for such computation.On February 2, 1928, the auditor filed a supplemental account showing that the complainants had made payments on account of the property, aggregating in amount over all allowances and deductions, including interest on deferred payments, $4,585.62.Exceptions to that account were filed but were never passed upon except in so far as they were involved in the issues decided at the final hearing of the case.On October 24, 1928, the complainants, upon their petition alleging that Louis Buckner was the actual owner of the property at the time of the supposed contract for its sale to Stanley and Eliza Jones was made, and that Alexander A. Buckner and Elsya, his wife, were mere nominal owners, were permitted to amend their bill by making Louis Bucknera partydefendant.Louis Buckner filed a motion ne recipiatur to the petition, and the original defendants demurred to the amended bill.

Both the motion and the demurrer were overruled, and those orders were affirmed on appeal to this court, Buckner v. Jones,157 Md. 239, 145 A. 550, and the cause remanded for further proceedings.Id.Upon its remand it came on for hearing before the chancellor then presiding in circuit courtNo. 2 of Baltimore city, testimony was taken before him, the case was heard, and at the conclusion of the hearing he decreed that the defendants convey to the complainants the Bond street property subject to the ground rent of $30.37, but otherwise free of all liens except state and city taxes and water rent, "upon payment by the Plaintiffs to the Defendants of the sum of $420.83, as set forth in the Auditor's Supplemental Report filed herein, as corrected by re-adjustment of in-interest, said amount being the balance due the Defendants by the Plaintiffs, on account of the purchase price of the premises No. 405 S. Bond Street, herein mentioned as per the said agreement herein specifically enforced, the Defendants having been allowed interest, expenses and expenditures in said Auditor's Supplemental Report."This appeal is from that decree.

The principal question submitted by it is whether the appellants did in March, 1919, enter into a valid and enforceable contract for the sale of the Bond street house to Stanley and Eliza Jones.Subsidiary to that are the further questions: (1) What part of the purchase price remains unpaid? and (2) Did the determination of that question by the chancellor involve the consideration of evidence taken before Louis Buckner was formally a party to the cause?These questions will be considered in the order in which they have been stated.

The first question is purely one of fact, and its determination largely turns upon the weight to be given the testimony of the parties themselves.If, as the appellees alleged, the appellants agreed orally to sell them the property for $5,000 payable in monthly installments, and they, the appellees, actually paid on account of the purchase price over $4,500, and were ready, willing, and able to complete the payments, then the appellants did enter into a valid contract for the sale of the property to Jones and his wife which a court of equity will specifically enforce.Buckner v. Jones, supra.

In support of their version of the transaction, the appellees offered the testimony of Stanley Jones, Eliza Jones, and John Edwards, while Louis Buckner, his wife, Mrs. Frances Buckner, and his son, Alexander A. Buckner, testified to the contrary.The only other witnesses were Charles Greenblatt, a real estate expert offered by the appellees, who testified that the value of the property in November, 1927, was about $3,500, and these witnesses for appellees, Israel Silberstein and Mrs. Elizabeth Tarun, whose testimony was wholly immaterial and may be disregarded, and Edward Geisler, who testified that in the seven years preceding 1926he had on several occasions made repairs to the Bond street property for Louis Buckner.So that the material witnesses form two groups, one composed of Stanley and Eliza Jones, interested witnesses and parties to the cause, and John Edwards, their friend, the other composed of Louis and Alexander A. Buckner, both interested parties to the cause, and Mrs. Frances Buckner, the wife of Louis Buckner.Considering the numerical equality of the two groups in valuing their testimony, consideration should be given, not only to the significance and effect of the facts to which they testified, but to the opportunities open to the respective witnesses of knowledge of them, as well as to the inherent probability of such facts, in view of the situation of the parties, and all other relevant circumstances.

In other words, when two witnesses or numerically equal groups of...