Roche v. Curtin

• Decision Date: 17 May 1944
• Citation: 131 Conn. 66,37 A.2d 805
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: ROCHE et al. v. CURTIN et al.

131 Conn. 66

37 A.2d 805

ROCHE et al.

v.CURTIN et al.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

May 17, 1944.

Appeal from Superior Court, Hartford County; Inglis, Judge.

Action by Elizabeth M. Roche and others against William F. Curtin and others to recover a broker's commission. From a judgment for defendants, plaintiffs appeal.

No error.

William M. Harney, of Hartford, for appellants.

Robert L. Halloran, of Hartford, for appellees.

MALTBIE, C. J., and BROWN, JENNINGS, DICKENSON, and WYNNE, JJ.

DICKENSON, Judge.

The plaintiffs, real estate brokers, brought the defendant owners and a customer together upon a price which the owners had agreed with the brokers to take, and the customer had agreed with them to pay, for the owner's property, but the sale was not consummated because of the failure of the plaintiffs to render financial assistance which they had agreed to give the customer to enable him to purchase the property. Some months later the customer himself procured the necessary funds and purchased the property. The plaintiffs claim to be the procuring cause of the sale. With such corrections of the finding as we find the plaintiffs entitled to, the material facts are as follows:

The plaintiffs were real estate brokers in partnership as to this matter. The defendants owned adjoining properties which the defendant William F. Curtin was the authorized agent to sell. On May 12, 1941, Curtin authorized the plaintiff Mrs. Roche to act as a broker in the sale of the properties at a price of $62,000, agreeing to pay her, if a sale was made, a commission of $3,000. The properties had been previously listed with other real estate brokers. None of the brokers had the exclusive agency to sell. At the time the property was listed with Mrs. Roche, Curtin gave her the data concerning the mortgages and income. Clement Kalkowski had been a tenant of the property for many years. He had made up his mind to purchase it if he could finance the purchase and had had many discussions with the owners and with other brokers with whom it was listed concerning its purchase, prior to its listing with Mrs. Roche, but not at the price given Mrs. Roche. The plaintiffs Roche and Zinnman interviewed Kalkowski, informed him that the property could be bought for $62,000 and offered to aid him in raising money to purchase it at that price. They made unsuccessful attempts to procure a larger first mortgage on the property and Kalkowski himself attempted to raise the money. The plaintiffs Roche and Zinnman finally agreed that they would personally loan him money on a second mortgage to enable him to purchase the property for $62,000. A meeting was held on August 12, 1941, between William Curtin, representing the defendants, the plaintiffs Roche and Zinnman, and Kalkowski, to arrange for a contract of sale to Kalkowski. At this meeting the plaintiff Mrs. Roche stated that she had been advised by a banker not to make a loan on a second mortgage and had decided not to. Kalkowski thereupon called her and Zinnman ‘double-crossers' and left the meeting. No contract was made and the plaintiffs had no further contract with Kalkowski, although they continued their attempts to procure other purchasers. Thereafter, Kalkowski made arrangements to finance the purchase himself with a loan from the Mutual Loan Bank of New Britain. Learning of this, Mrs. Roche claimed a commission and Kalkowski refused to proceed with the transaction on the ground that she was not entitled to it. Later, on Novement 21, 1941, the defendants entered into a written agreement with Edward Kalkowski, Clement Kalkowski's representative, for the sale of the property for $59,000 on or before January 2, 1942. The plaintiff Riley filed a caveat on the property claiming full commission for the sale. The property was conveyed by the defendants to Clement Kalkowski's two sons as his nominees on January 3, 1943. The bank refused to make the loan required to perfect the sale without protection against the claim in the caveat, whereupon it was agreed that William Curtin would loan $3,000 to the Kalkowskis which was to be deposited with the bank to save it harmless from brokers' commissions.

The trial court further found that the plaintiffs were not the procuring cause of the purchase of the property by Kalkowski. Such a finding ‘is to be regarded as one of fact and conclusive ‘unless contrary to or unsupported by the subordinate facts, or in conflict with the settled rules of logic and reason, or found in violation of some rule or principle of law.’' Housatonic Valley Ins. Agency, Inc., v. Klipstein, 125 Conn. 274, 278, 5 A.2d 16, 19; Rosenfield v. Wall, 94 Conn. 418, 420, 109 A. 409, 9 A.L.R. 1189; Seward v. Seward & Son Co., 91 Conn. 190, 193, 99 A. 887. The question is whether in the light of this principle there was error in the conclusion of the...