Bankers Life Insurance v. Ohrt

270 N.W. 497, 131 Neb. 858, 1936 Neb. LEXIS 309
Nebraska Supreme Court·Decided December 23, 1936·No. No. 29767·Published·Cited by 34 cases

Opinion

Goss, C. J.

Defendants Minna Ohrt, George Ohrt, Eggert J. Ohrt and Nancy Ohrt appeal from a decree of foreclosure.

Plaintiff foreclosed a mortgage on land owned and mortgaged to it by Minna Ohrt and husband, George Ohrt. Minna Ohrt had originally acquired this land from her father and mother, Eggert Oft and Rosa Oft, by warranty deed dated February 8, 1919, which contained the following covenant or condition:

“Subject'to the following stipulation: Grantee herein agrees to pay to the grantors, so long as either one may live, $500 on the first day of September each and every year, this being a part of the consideration for the purchase of said land.”

Eggert Oft had died on March 1, 1931. So when plaintiff took the note and mortgage it required Rosa Oft to join the Ohrts in their execution.

Rosa Oft cross-petitioned to preserve her lien upon the land subject only to plaintiff’s prior mortgage lien, which she conceded to be such.

[860] Bank of Bennington set up a noté and mortgage subject to plaintiff’s mortgage but not conceding that it was subject to Rosa. Oft!s claim. .

Minna Ohrt and George Ohrt pleaded that, when the deed to this land was made in favor of Minna Ohrt by the Ofts on February 8, 1919, it was really made in consideration of services of their daughter Minna to her father and mother for a series of years from .1896 to 1901; and that at.the time of the transfer it was. orally, agreed by the Ofts and their daughter Minna, that the payment of the $500 each year, starting September 1, 1919, was conditioned (1) upon the land producing that much each year above the cost of .production, and-conditioned (2) upon-the necessity of the Ofts of that sum for their support and maintenance, and was conditioned further (3) upon the oral agreement that, in case of such necessity, the Ofts would require each of the children (three others of whom had like contracts with their parents) to prorate the necessary sum for the maintenance of their father and mother so that “one would hot be required to pay more than the other.” The answer of Minna and George Ohrt further pleads an oral agreement made June 19, 1919, with Rosa Oft and her husband, Eggert, in which it was agreed by the Ofts, as owners of certain lots improved by a two-story büilding, that if Minna and her three sisters, with their husbands, would furnish the money to improve the building, at an estimated cost of something over $3,000, the said Minna and her sisters should receive one-fourth óf the income from said property thereafter and upon the death of their' parents should receive the property'; that Minna Ohrt and George Ohrt, pursuant to that agreement, paid out as their share of such improvement in 1919 and 1920 a total of $937.38; that, shortly aftér the daughters improved the premises, the Ofts placed Roy Gordon, husband of Nancy Gordon, their youngest daughter, in charge of the operation of the premises and ever since he has cóntinüed to do a large and lucrative business in said property for the Ofts and, since the death of Eggert Oft, for Rosa Oft; that Rosa Oft has [861] conveyed said property to' Nancy Gordon in consideration of one dollar and love and affection ;■ that Minna and George are entitled to an accounting for the profits of said premises from June, 1919, or,, in'lieu thereof, to-the $937.38, with interest from- the date of -their payments.

■ Further, the Ohrts alleged that in May, 1920, -Minna and her sisters learned that Eggert Oft had become indebted to the Bank of Bennington in excess of $9,000 and orally agreed with the Ofts'that each of them would share equally in the payment of that debt of the parent on the condition-that their payments would be credited on account of their annual payments on their respective farms at any time it was not -convenient for them to make the annual payments; that Minna and her husband contributed' $2,-554.75 to Eggert Oft on May 22, 1920, which was- used to pay the debt to the -bank, have made all annual $500 payments in cash on the contract in the deed of-February 8, 1919, up to and including all of the 1931 payment and paid $20 on 1932 payment on June-23, 1933, and are entitled to all payments made by them as credits on the balance of the 1932 annual payment and subsequent thereto.

Eggert J. Ohrt and Nancy Ohrt answered that they are tenants from year to year, and that they have the right to remove certain property upon termination of their lease, viz.: Lawn-fence, Westinghouse light-plant with wiring and fixtures, galvanized steel grain-bin, one frame hog-house, two brooder-houses, 160 rods of hog-wire and posts and one Nesbit hot-air furnace.

The decree allowed plaintiff’s lien as a first lien; found that the lawn-fence, including steel posts and gates, the Westinghouse light-plant with- wiring and fixtures, and the Nesbit hot-air furnace, claimed by Eggert J. Ohrt and Nancy Ohrt, were affixed to and a part of the real estate; that the condition of the deed from Eggert Oft and Rosa Oft to Minna Ohrt created a lien on the land for a $500 charge each year, and Minna Ohrt, by allowing the mortgage to become delinquent, had jeopardized her mother’s lien; that the present worth of that lien is $4,055, and Rosa [862] Oft is entitled to a foreclosure thereof subject to plaintiff’s first lien; that the Bank of Bennington is entitled to a lien and foreclosure thereof subject to the preceding named liens; and that the grain-bin, the" hog-house, two brooder-houses and 160 rods of hog-wire and posts are the personal property of Eggert J. Ohrt. Decree was entered accordingly.

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Bankers Life Insurance v. Ohrt, 270 N.W. 497, 131 Neb. 858, 1936 Neb. LEXIS 309 (Neb. 1936).

270 N.W. 497 (Bankers Life Insurance v. Ohrt) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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