Riley v. Bear Creek Planning Committee

• Decision Date: 12 July 1976
• Docket Number: S.F. 23374
• Citation: 17 Cal.3d 500,131 Cal.Rptr. 381
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 551 P.2d 1213 Ernest H. RILEY et al., Plaintiffs, Cross-Defendants and Respondents, v. BEAR CREEK PLANNING COMMITTEE, Defendant, Cross-Complainant and Appellant, Harvey N. Black, Jr., et al., Defendants and Appellants.

Page 381

131 Cal.Rptr. 381

17 Cal.3d 500, 551 P.2d 1213

Ernest H. RILEY et al., Plaintiffs, Cross-Defendants and Respondents, v. BEAR CREEK PLANNING COMMITTEE, Defendant, Cross-Complainant and Appellant Harvey N. Black, Jr., et al., Defendants and Appellants.

S.F. 23374.

Supreme Court of California In Bank.

July 12, 1976.

Stark, Stewart, Simon & Sparrowe, V. James Jackl, Oakland, Cadwalader & Black and Harvey N. Black, Jr., San Francisco, for defendant, cross-complainant and appellant and for defendants and appellants.

Franklin H. Tuttle, Auburn, Richard E. Tuttle, Mokelumne Hill, and Thomas S. Harte, San Francisco, for plaintiffs, corss-defendants and respondents.

BY THE COURT.

In this proceeding, arising out of an effort by defendants Bear Creek Planning Committee and some of its members to enforce certain building restrictions alleged to control the construction of improvements on plaintiffs' real property, defendants appeal from a judgment quieting title in plaintiffs. After decision by the Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District, affirming the judgment, we granted a hearing in this court for the purpose of giving further consideration to the issues raised. Having made a thorough examination of the cause, we have concluded that the opinion of the Court of Appeal prepared by Presiding Justice Puglia and concurred in by Justices Janes and Evans correctly treats and disposes of the issues involved, and we adopt such opinion as and for the opinion of this court. Such opinion (with appropriate deletions and additions) is as follows: ^*

( ) Central to the disposition of this appeal is the question whether or not plaintiffs' property is burdened by an equitable servitude for the benefit of other lots in the tract of which plaintiffs' property is a part.

On February 26, 1964, Alpine Slopes Development Company (hereinafter 'grantor'), a limited partnership, by grant deed conveyed Lot 101 in Alpine Meadows Estates Subdivision No. 3, located in Placer County, to Ernest H. and Jewel Riley, husband and wife. ¹ The deed, recorded March 13, 1964, contains no restrictions upon the use of the plaintiffs' property nor is there any reference therein to any instrument purporting to impose restrictions upon Lot 101. In fact, at the time of the conveyance there was no document of record purporting to restrict the use of Lot 101.

On November 25, 1964, exactly nine months after the conveyance to plaintiffs, the grantor caused to be recorded with the Placer County Recorder a document entitled 'Declaration of Covenants, Conditions, Restrictions and Reservations on Lots 72 through 116 of Alpine Meadows Estates Unit No. 3' (referred to hereinafter as 'declaration'). The declaration was executed by an agent of the grantor and by him acknowledged on November 20, 1964. Preliminarily the declaration recites that grantor is the owner and subdivider of Lots 72 through 116 inclusive (which are particularly described therein by reference to a recorded map); that 'it (grantor) ^* has established and does hereby establish a general plan for the improvement and development of said property and does hereby establish restrictions, easements, conditions, covenants and reservations upon and subject to which all of the aforementioned lots and parcels of said real property shall be improved and sold or conveyed by it as such owner, each and all of which is or are for the benefit of the (grantor) ^* and the owner of any part or parcel of said property or interest therein and shall apply to and bind the respective successors in interest of the owner or owners thereof and are, and each thereof is, imposed upon said property as a servitude in favor of each subsequent declarant and of each and every parcel of land therein as a dominant tenement or tenements . . ..' There follow 26 numbered paragraphs in which restrictions, covenants and conditions common to subdivision developments of the type here involved are spelled out which are to remain in full force and effect until January 1, 1983.

It is the plaintiffs' alleged violation of the provisions of paragraph 6 of the declaration that precipitated the instant controversy. Insofar as relevant, paragraph 6 provides: 'No dwelling, garage, building, fence, wall, retaining wall or other structure or excavation therefor shall be moved onto, commenced, erected or maintained on said lots, nor shall any addition to, change, or alteration therein, be made until the plans and specifications for same have been submitted to the Bear Creek Planning Committee and the approval of said Committee has been secured, . . .' ²

At a time not established by the record, the plaintiffs constructed a snow tunnel on their lot. In reaction thereto, on January 12, 1972, the committee recorded a 'Notice of Violation of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions.' Referring specifically to Lot 101 and the declaration recorded November 25, 1964, the notice recited the 'probable violation' of the provisions of the declaration in that 'A covered walkway has been constructed on said lot 101 without prior compliance with Paragraph 6 of the above described recorded restrictions.'

Thereafter plaintiffs filed their complaint to quiet title and for damages for slander of title and defendant cross-complained for declaratory relief. The resulting judgment quieted plaintiffs' title to Lot 101 against all claims of defendants and found for plaintiffs and against defendant on the latter's cross-complaint for declaratory relief. ³

Inasmuch as there is no privity of contract between defendants and plaintiffs, ( ) (defendants') right to enforce use restrictions against plaintiffs depends upon whether or not the restrictions sought to be enforced are comprehended within mutually enforceable equitable servitudes for the benefit of the tract. (Trahms v. Starrett (1973) 34 Cal.App.3d 766, 772, 110 Cal.Rptr. 239; Ross v. Harootunian (1967) 257 Cal.App.2d 292, 295, 64 Cal.Rptr. 537; see Girard v. Miller (1963) 214 Cal.App.2d 266, 278--279, 29 Cal.Rptr. 359, dissenting opn. of Files, J.) The issue thus framed, ( ) (defendants') claim founders upon the rule announced in Werner v. Graham (1919) 181 Cal. 174, at pages 183--185, 183 P. 945, at page 949: 'It is undoubted that when the owner of a subdivided tract conveys the various parcels in the tract by deeds containing appropriate language imposing restrictions on each parcel as part of a general plan of restrictions common to all the parcels and designed for their mutual benefit, mutual equitable servitudes are thereby created in favor of each parcel as against all the others. The agreement between the grantor and each grantee in such a case as expressed in the instruments between them is both that the parcel conveyed shall be subject to restrictions in accordance with the plan for the benefit of all the other parcels and also that all other parcels shall be subject to such restrictions for its benefit. In such a case the mutual servitudes spring into existence as between the first parcel conveyed and the balance of the parcels at the time of the first conveyance. As each conveyance follows, the burden and the benefit of the mutual restrictions imposed by preceding conveyances as between the particular parcel conveyed and those previously conveyed pass as an incident of the ownership of the parcel, and similar restrictions are created by the conveyance as between the lot conveyed and the lots still retained by the original owner. . . . ( ) ^* (H) ^*Ere there is no language in the instruments between the parties, that is, the deeds, which refers to a common plan of restrictions or which expresses or in any way indicates any agreement between grantor and grantee that the lot conveyed is taken subject to any such plan. . . . ( ) ^* The intent of the common grantor--the original owner--is clear enough. He had a general plan of restrictions in mind. But it is not his intent that governs. It is the joint intent of himself and his grantees, and as between him and each of his grantees the instrument or instruments between them, in this case the deed, constitute the final and exclusive memorial of such intent. It is also apparent that each deed must be construed as of the time it is given. It cannot be construed as of a later date, and in particular, its construction and effect cannot be varied because of deeds which the grantor may subsequently give to other parties. . . . Whatever rights were created by the deed were created and vested (when it was given), ^* and the fact that it later appears that (the grantor) ^* was pursuing a general plan common to all the lots in the tract cannot vary those rights. The same is true of each deed as it was given. Nor does it make any difference that, as claimed by the defendants, (the grantor) ^* gave each grantee to understand, and each grantee did understand, that the restrictions were exacted as part of a general scheme. Such understanding was not incorporated in the deeds, and as we have said, the deeds in this case constitute the final and exclusive memorials of the understandings between the parties. Any understanding not incorporated in them is wholly immaterial in the absence of a reformation. (Citations.) ^* This whole discussion may in fact be summed up in the simple statement that, if the parties desire to create mutual rights in real property of the character of those claimed here, they must say so, and must say it in the only place where it can be given legal effect, namely, in the written instruments exchanged between them which constitute the final expression of their understanding.' (See also Murry v. Lovell (1955) 132 Cal.App.2d 30, 281 P.2d 316.) ⁴

From the recordation of the first deed which effectively imposes restrictions on the land conveyed and that retained by the common grantor, the restrictions are binding upon all subsequent grantees of parcels so affected who take with notice thereof notwithstanding that similar clauses have been...