Pigeon v. Hatheway

• Decision Date: 27 February 1968
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: Robert J. PIGEON, Executor (ESTATE of Mary C. Hatheway) v. Earl HATHEWAY.

Page 523

239 A.2d 523

156 Conn. 175

Robert J. PIGEON, Executor (ESTATE of Mary C. Hatheway) v. Earl HATHEWAY.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Feb. 27, 1968.

Donald B. Caldwell, Rockville, for appellant (defendant).

Etalo G. Gnutti, Stafford Springs, for appellee (plaintiff).

Before ALCORN, HOUSE, THIM, RYAN and COVELLO, JJ.

RYAN, Associate Justice.

The plaintiff, Robert J. Pigeon, executor of the estate of Mary C. Hatheway, brought this action, which the parties have seen fit to treat as one to quiet title to certain real estate, requesting the court to declare invalid an option to purchase the property in question. The trial court rendered judgment for the plaintiff, and the defendant has appealed.

Although the right of the plaintiff executor to bring this action is not disputed by the defendant, we cannot overlook the well-settled law that title to real estate passes to the heirs or devisees immediately on the death of the owner. It does not vest in the executor or administrator. We have permitted an action by an administrator to remove a cloud on title when resort to the realty is necessary to pay administration expenses or claims against the estate. Munger v. Doolan, 75 Conn. 656, 662, 55 A. 169. We do not have such a factual situation in the present case. Section 45-257 of the General Statutes provides in part: 'The court of probate having jurisdiction of the settlement of the estate of any deceased person may, concurrently with courts of equity, authorize the executor or administrator to convey the title of the deceased in any real estate to any person entitled to it by virtue of any contract of such deceased person.' This statute concerns personalty. 'The estate of an owner of real estate under contract of sale, under the doctrine of equitable conversion, becomes in equity an estate in personalty and in case of his death before his contract is performed, or fully performed, the contract and the proceeds thereof are personal property or assets in the hands of his administrator or personal representative to be administered as the rest of his personal assets are administered. Emery v. Cooley, 83 Conn. 235, 76 A. 529; Note, 34 Ann.Cas.1914D, p. 419.' Bowne v. Ide, 109 Conn. 307, 315, 147 A. 4, 7; see Brookfield v. Hutchins, 126 Conn. 435, 440, 11 A.2d 853; 2 Locke & Kohn, Conn. Probate Practice § 386. In the instant case, we are concerned with the validity of an option to purchase realty which is, of course, a unilateral contract of sale and must be treated as personalty in the hands of the plaintiff executor. Upon this basis we treat the case as the parties and the court have done as an action brought pursuant to § 47-31 of the General Statutes, which provides for settling title to personalty as well as realty.

The finding of subordinate facts, which is unattacked, recites the following facts: Mary C. Hatheway, hereinafter referred to as the decedent, died on April 12, 1965, leaving a will in which the plaintiff was named executor. On April 29, 1949, the decedent was the owner of an undivided one-half interest, as a tenant in common, with Mary M. Hatheway, in land and buildings situated in the town of Ellington. On that date the decedent executed to the defendant an option to urchase her interest in part of this land. The decedent was the defendant's aunt. Mary M. Hatheway, the defendant's mother, also executed an option to the defendant for her interest in part of the premises, but this option is not involved in the present litigation. The option in question was not recorded in the land records of the town of Ellington until June 27, 1962. The pertinent portion of the instrument is printed in a footnote. ¹ Subsequent to the date of the execution of this option, the decedent conveyed from the premises in question her interest in three parcels of land. One of these conveyances was to the defendant. The option was not mentioned in any of these deeds. She also executed, subsequent to the date of the option, three leases of the premises in question, two being to the defendant and one to the Hatheway Tobacco Company. The option was not mentioned in any of these leases. Each of the leases contained the following provision: 'Excepting therefrom approximately one acre with the buildings and improvements thereon which are at present used and occupied by the lessors for their home.' At the time of the execution of these leases, the parties to the leases agreed that the potato warehouse and the tobacco sheds were to be excluded. Whether the barns or sheds near the dwelling as shown on a map presented in evidence by the defendant were the excluded buildings is unknown. The defendant's map, drawn to scale at his direction, was admitted in evidence for the limited purpose of showing the relative positions and sizes of buildings and driveways on the premises in question. The lines drawn on the map delineating distances and directions on four sides were not admitted in evidence. The locations of buildings and driveways were found to be correct as shown on this map. Certain stakes shown on this map were those which the defendant authorized and directed the surveyor to place just before the time of trial.

The court made a visual inspection of the premises and found the following facts: No natural or artificial bounds, other than the stakes placed in the ground just prior to the trial, denote any boundary. The northerly line of the home lot, as claimed by the defendant, is three feet from the barn northerly of this line. If that line were accepted, the southerly line as claimed by the defendant would encroach about five to six feet into cultivated land under a lease which specifically excluded the so-called house lot. If the defendant's claim as to the location of the westerly line were accepted, a portion of land which extends easterly of this line and measures about thirty-three feet by sixty-six feet is, and has been, cultivated by the defendant and the corporation of which he is an officer as part of leased premises from which the house lot was specifically excluded. The westerly line as claimed by the defendant is about two and one-half feet from an existing barn or shed located westerly of the claimed line. The door on this shed which is about five feet wide swings, when open, about two and one-half feet into the area which the defendant claims to be the home or house lot.

From the evidence and its inspection of the premises, the trial court concluded that the boundaries of the excluded house lot, as claimed by the defendant, have no relationship to a dwelling with outbuildings naturally appurtenant to such a dwelling especially in a rural area; that a description of the excepted premises could not be ascertained by oral proof; that the boundaries of the excepted parcel are so indefinite and uncertain as to make the boundaries of the remaining land described in the option so indefinite and uncertain as to be unenforceable; that the description used for the excepted parcel is too uncertain and indefinite to satisfy General Statutes § 52-550; and that the general description of the land to be conveyed in the option is too uncertain and indefinite to satisfy § 52-550. Judgment was rendered that title to the interest of the estate of Mary C. Hatheway be quieted and settled in the estate free of any claim of the defendant by virtue of the option to purchase.

The defendant assigns error in the conclusions reached by the trial court. The principal issue in this appeal is whether the exception of the premises described as the 'house lot' is so indefinite as to make the entire description of the land in the option to purchase indefinite.

The option to purchase relates to an interest in land and is subject to the Statute of Frauds. Didriksen v. Havens, 136 Conn. 41, 46, 68 A.2d 163. Under our statute, the option 'must state the contract between the parties with such certainty that the essentials of the contract can be determined from the memorandum itself without the aid of parol proof, either by direct statement or by reference therein to some other writing or thing certain; and these essentials must at least consist of the subject of the sale, the terms of it, and the parties to it, so as to furnish evidence of a complete agreement.' Santoro v. Mack, 108 Conn. 683, 687, 145 A. 273, 275; Marsico v. Kessler, 149 Conn. 236, 237, 178 A.2d 154; Montanaro v. Pandolfini, 148 Conn. 153, 157, 168 A.2d 550; Garre v. Geryk, 145 Conn. 669, 672, 145 A.2d 829. The description of land contained in a contract of sale or any option to purchase is sufficiently definite to satisfy the requirements of the Statute of Frauds 'whenever it is reasonably certain from the contract itself, or can be made certain through reference to record, contract, map or fact, by resort to extraneous evidence thereof, whether oral or written.' McMahon v. Plumb, 88 Conn. 547, 552, 92 A. 113, 115; Peterson v. Bray, 138 Conn. 227, 230, 83 A.2d 198. The defendant concedes that the description of the exception by itself is indefinite and general. It is, however, the claim of the defendant that, in the light of all the surrounding circumstances, the boundaries of the land...