Butler v. Nelson

• Decision Date: 15 March 1887
• Parties: BUTLER v. NELSON AND OTHERS, AND SEVEN OTHER LIKE CASES.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

72 Iowa 732

32 N.W. 399

BUTLER

v.NELSON AND OTHERS, AND SEVEN OTHER LIKE CASES.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

March 15, 1887.

Appeals from circuit court, Page county.

The plaintiffs in the several actions are judgment creditors of the defendant H. N. Nelson, and they brought their actions in equity to subject certain real estate, the title to which was in defendant E. G. Bowman, to satisfaction of their judgments. During the pendency of the actions Bowman conveyed the property to Nelson, who pleaded that a portion of it was his homestead, and was exempt from sale on execution for the satisfaction of plaintiffs' judgment. The circuit court adjudged that the portion claimed as a homestead was exempt as such, but entered judgment subjecting the balance to plaintiffs' judgments. Plaintiffs appealed.L. B. Cake and W. W. Marsman, for appellants.

Smith McPherson and F. P. Greenlee, for appellees.

REED, J.

The facts of the cases are not in dispute. The property in question is a farm of 120 acres. Nelson became the owner of the farm in 1879, and immediately entered into the possession and occupancy of the same. The dwelling-house and other buildings pertaining to the farm are all situated on one 40-acre tract, and that is the tract now claimed as a homestead. He subsequently contracted the debts which are evidenced by plaintiffs' judgments. In 1885, after the debts were contracted, he conveyed the farm to Bowman, his wife joining in the conveyance. Bowman paid no consideration for the conveyance, and it was made for the purpose of hindering and delaying the creditors of Nelson in the collection of their debts. Nelson and his family continued in the possession and occupancy of the place until the reconveyance by Bowman, which was by quitclaim, and was made after these suits were instituted.

The question whether the property is exempt from judicial sale for the satisfaction of plaintiffs' judgments is to be determined from these facts. If it can be said that Nelson was divested of the property by the conveyance to Bowman, and reinvested with it by the conveyance from him, it would be very clear that it would not be exempt. In determining the question, the fact that the conveyance to Bowman was voluntary, and was made with a fraudulent intent, is not material; for, as the homestead was not subject to be appropriated for the satisfaction of the debts, the conveyance of that property was not fraudulent as to the creditors, whatever the intention of the parties in making the conveyance may have been. As the creditors could not have appropriated it for the satisfaction of their claim, they could not be defrauded by the conveyance. Hence it was not fraudulent.

Nor can Nelson be heard now to assert any right based...