Douglas v. Medical Investors, Inc.

• Decision Date: 30 July 1971
• Docket Number: No. 19262,19262
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: John W. DOUGLAS, Jr., Respondent, v. MEDICAL INVESTORS, INC., Appellant.

Page 720

182 S.E.2d 720

256 S.C. 440

John W. DOUGLAS, Jr., Respondent, v. MEDICAL INVESTORS, INC., Appellant.

No. 19262.

Supreme Court of South Carolina.

July 30, 1971.

J. M. Shoemaker, Jr., of Wyche, Burgess, Freeman & Parham, Greenville, for appellant.

W. H. Arnold, of Love, Thornton, Arnold & Thomason, Greenville, for respondent.

LEWIS, Justice.

This is an action for declaratory judgment in which the parties seek a determination of whether defendant-appellant, Medical Investors, Inc., has an easement for a driveway across plaintiff-respondent's property. The right of appellant to the easement depends upon the validity of a reservation in a deed by its predecessor in title and, whether, if valid, the easement reserved was transferable. The latter depends upon the character of the easement involved. The appeal is from an order of the lower court holding that the reservation of the easement was ineffective to create any transferable interest in the driveway in question.

Appellant's predecessor in title, L. H. McCalla, owned an L-shaped lot of land in Greenville, South Carolina, which fronted on Calhoun and Pendleton Streets. It fronted 50 feet on Pendleton, extending back therefrom a distance of 195 feet; and fronted 45 feet on Calhoun Street, extending back from it 162 feet. The intersection of the two streets was about 112 feet from the nearest property line on Pendleton and 150 feet from that on Calhoun. The area lying between the L-shaped lot of McCalla and the intersection was owned by others.

The record conclusively shows that the lots in the particular area in question were used for commercial purposes.

In 1955, L. H. McCalla sold to James N. Threadgill the entire frontage of his property (45 feet) on Calhoun Street to a depth of 75 feet, which left the remainder of the McCalla property still in somewhat of an L-shape with only a frontage on Pendleton Street. McCalla's remaining lot measured 50 feet in width for a distance of 125 feet from Pendleton and then widened to approximately 80 feet for the remainder of its depth. The rear of the remainder of the McCalla property was then 195 feet from Pendleton Street, on which it fronted, and only 75 feet from Calhoun Street across the lot being sold to Threadgill.

Under the foregoing situation, McCalla reserved, in the deed to Threadgill, an easement over the lot conveyed for a joint driveway 18 feet in width from Calhoun Street to his remaining property, in the following language:

'The grantor herein reserves unto himself, his heirs and assigns, an easement or right-of-way over and across a strip of land, eighteen feet in width at all points, lying along the northern side of the lot above described and adjacent to the above mentioned property now or formerly of Whitworth and Wyatt. Said strip is reserved for use by the grantor, his heirs and assigns as a driveway leading to the grantor's adjacent property immediately to the west of the lot above described, and the easement herein reserved shall run with the grantor's said adjacent property and shall be appurtenant thereto. Nothing herein shall be construed, however, so as to prevent the use of said strip of land, for driveway purposes, by the grantee herein, his heirs and assigns, or by his invitees on the premises; it being the intention hereof that said strip of land shall remain open as a joint driveway to serve the above described property and the adjacent property of the grantor.'

Threadgill, grantee in the foregoing deed, conveyed to the respondent, Douglas, in 1956, the lot acquired from McCalla, and the deed contained the following recital:

'The above described property being the same conveyed to me by deed recorded in the R.M.C. office for Greenville County in Deed Book 524, at page 279, And this conveyance is made subject to the 18-foot joint driveway referred to in said deed.' (Emphasis added.)

McCalla conveyed to appellant, in 1966, the remainder of his property, including his interest in the driveway over respondent's property, as reserved in his 1955 deed to Threadgill.

Therefore, respondent now owns the lot of land over which the easement for the driveway was reserved; and appellant owns the property, for the benefit of which the easement was created, each respectively holding subject to such burdens or rights as arose under the original reservation of the easement.

The first question concerns the contention that the reservation of the easement in the deed from McCalla to Threadgill is repugnant to the fee simple title granted and is, therefore, ineffective.

The reservation of the easement in question followed the description in the deed. Both the granting and habendum clauses conveyed a fee simple title without mention of reservation of the easement. The lower court sustained respondent's contention that the reservation was inconsistent with the fee simple title previously granted, and was therefore invalid, under the well established principle that when the granting clause in a deed conveys a fee simple title it cannot be reduced or cut down by subsequent language in the instrument. In so holding, the lower court was in error.

'An easement is a right which one person has to use the land of another for a specific purpose.' Steele v. Williams, 204 S.C. 124, 28 S.E.2d 644; and 'gives no title to the land on which the servitude is imposed,' Morris v. Townsend, 253 S.C. 628, 172 S.E.2d 819. An easement is therefore not an estate in lands in the usual sense.

We have recognized that an easement may be created by reservation in a deed. Sandy Island Corp. v. Ragsdale, 246 S.C. 414, 143 S.E.2d 803.

The easement in this case did not create an estate in the lands affected but only reserved a joint right to use the driveway. It in no way cut down the fee simple estate conveyed. Therefore,...