Collins v. Curtin

• Decision Date: 08 December 1949
• Parties: COLLINS et al. v. CURTIN.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

325 Mass. 123

89 N.E.2d 211

COLLINS et al. v. CURTIN.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Middlesex.

December 8, 1949

Argued Nov. 10 1949.

G. F. Hannigan Lowell, for plaintiffs.

P. R. Achin Lowell, for defendants.

Before QUA, C. J and LUMMUS, RONAN, WILKINS and WILLIAMS, JJ.

WILLIAMS, Justice.

This is an appeal from a decree ordering the defendant to convey to the plaintiffs a certain parcel of real estate consisting of a duplex house and land numbered 33 and 35 Alder Street Dracut. The judge made a voluntary report of material facts stating that they were all the material facts upon which his order for decree was based. The evidence, which is reported, is substantially as follows: The plaintiffs are the widow and children of one William B. Collins. Collins and his family occupied one half of the duplex house, which was owned by the Textile Realty Company. On November 22, 1933, the property was sold at auction, and Collins purporting to act as agent for his sister, the defendant, bid it in for a price of $425. At the time he was without funds, was in debt, and was working on W. P. A. (Works Progress Administration). He made a down payment of $45 which he had borrowed from one Riley. Having authorized the actioneer to have the deed made out to the defendant as grantee, he notified her at her home in New York of what had happened. She had no previous knowledge of the prospective sale. Shortly thereafter she came to Dracut, repaid Riley his loan of $45, and also paid to those representing the grantor the balance of $380 remaining due on the purchase price. The property was then conveyed to her by deed dated December 14, 1933, which deed was later recorded for her on March 31, 1934. The Collins family continued to live in their half of the house until Collins's death in 1947. Collins paid the taxes and over a period of years greatly improved the property. At the time of the present suit it was estimated to be worth $5,000. Collins died on December 11, 1947, leaving the plaintiffs as his only heirs. No assertion of any beneficial interest in the title was made by the defendant until March, 1948, when she wrote to the tenant of the half of the house not occupied by the Collins family demanding that the rent, which up to that time had been paid to Collins and after his death to his widow, be paid to her, the defendant. Thereafter she collected rent from the tenant to the amount of $195. In December, 1948, she demanded rent from Mrs. Collins, the widow of her brother.

The question for decision is whether it was the intention of Collins and his sister at the time the property was purchased that she should take and hold title for his benefit or for her own. It is settled that, when a person pays the purchase price of property and takes title in the name of another, the beneficial interest in the property enures to the person who paid the purchase price, by way of resulting trust. Howe v. Howe, 199 Mass. 598, 600-601, 85 N.E. 945, 127 Am.St.Rep. 516; Druker v. Druker, 308 Mass. 229 230, 31 N.E.2d 524; Restatement: Trusts, ss. 440, 448. See Moat v. Moat, 301 Mass. 469, 17 N.E.2d 710; MacNeil v. MacNeil, 312 Mass. 183, 43 N.E.2d 667. The judge found that at the time of the sale Collins 'was on the WPA and for that reason did...