Century Electric Co. v. Commissioner

15 T.C. 581
CourtUnited States Tax Court
DecidedOctober 31, 1950
DocketDocket No. 13115
StatusPublished

This text of 15 T.C. 581 (Century Electric Co. v. Commissioner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Tax Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Century Electric Co. v. Commissioner, 15 T.C. 581 (tax 1950).

Opinions

OPINION.

Johnson, Judge:

Petitioner corporation as of December 1, 1943, conveyed certain foundry property described in our findings of fact to the Trustees of William Jewell College. The consideration stated in the deed was $150,000, which amount was paid in cash to petitioner. It is stipulated that the adjusted basis of the property was $531,710.97, and that the property was used in petitioner’s business. As of the date of the conveyance petitioner leased back from the Trustees of William Jewell College the same property. It is. petitioner’s position that it incurred a deductible loss in 1943 of $381,710.97 under section 112 (a),1 Internal Revenue Code.

Respondent disallowed the claimed loss. One of the grounds given by respondent for his position, among several alternative grounds, is that “the transfer of property in consideration for $150,000.00 and a leasehold constitutes an exchange of like property under which no deductible loss is recognizable” under sections 112 (b) (1) 2 and 112 (e),3 Internal Revenue Code, and Regulations 111, section 29.112 (b) (1)-1.4

Respondent asserts, and petitioner does not dispute, that the leasehold received by petitioner, the lessee, to the foundry property herein constituted “a leasehold of a fee with 30 years or more to run.” (See Regulations 111, section 29.112 (b) (1) — 1, supra.) The indenture of lease provided:

* * * the term of this lease shall be divided into eight periods, the first of which shall be for twenty-five (25) years, and the seven remaining periods shall each be for ten years and shall run consecutively, so as to make this lease continuous in its operations from the beginning until its final termination; provided that the lessee shall have the absolute power to terminate this lease at the end of any one of said eight periods, as hereinafter set forth.

There seems no question, therefore, but that the lessee, petitioher, received a lease for a term of 95 years, subject only to its, the lessee’s, right of cancellation. It is not disputed that petitioner was “not a dealer in real estate”. (See the cited regulations.)

But petitioner urges that the foundry property was not “exchanged” for the leasehold in that the transaction consisted of a sale of the property to William Jewell College for $150,000 in cash, and a leaseback by the College to petitioner. To be sure, the only consideration stated in the deed conveying the property was the sum of $150,000. But in the special meeting of petitioner’s board of directors on December 9,1948, at which the proposed transaction was approved, petitioner’s board of directors specifically adopted a resolution that “as a condition of said sale of property and rights, this corporation will acquire from Trustees of William Jewell Collége, a Missouri Corporation, an Indenture of Lease.” The term and rentals of the lease in the resolution were identical with those incorporated in the actual indenture of lease. The facts clearly show, and petitioner agrees, that the foundry property was necessary in its business and that there was thus never any intention on petitioner’s part to discontinue its foundry operations. Hence it is indisputable that petitioner would have made no sale unless along with such sale it could receive a leaseback on the property. Thus the successive steps of sale and lease-back were integrated parts of a single transaction and accordingly that transaction must be adjudged to have consisted of an exchange of real property for cash and a leasehold.

But petitioner contends that “if the transaction be reduced to its substance”, it was not an exchange, but “a sale of the fee in the foundry property with the leasehold reserved.” However, the facts show, and we see no justification for disregarding them, that petitioner conveyed to William Jewell College a fee simple estate in possession, not in reversion, and that from that estate in possession William Jewell College executed a lease to petitioner.

But, petitioner argues, the type of leasehold contemplated by Regulations 111, section 29.112 (b) (1)-1, supra, “is one' already in existence — as the usual, 99 or 999 year lease possibly partly expired— which can be the property of one person and can be exchanged for real estate belonging to another. Here there was at no time one party with a leasehold and another with real estate.” We see no merit in this argument. There is no requirement in the cited regulation of prior existence or of partial expiration for a leasehold to be considered property of like kind with a fee. There is no reason why a leasehold at the beginning of its term may not be so considered. Furthermore, there is no requirement in the statute or regulations that for a transaction to constitute an exchange under section 112 (b) (1), both parties to the transaction must own the properties to be exchanged before the transfer of either property is made. We see no reason why one party may not “exchange” property, within the meaning of the statute, for property the other party is to acquire simultaneously or thereafter. We think that the test of an exchange is not whether the transfers are simultaneous but whether they are reciprocal. As we have already pointed out, petitioner only transferred the foundry property pursuant to resolutions of its board of directors that it receive cash and a lease in return.

But petitioner contends that a fee in property can not be property of like kind with a lease in the same property. We do not agree. There is no requirement in the statute or the regulations that to constitute an exchange of properties of like kind the properties exchanged must not be properties or rights in the same property. Previous decisions of this Court and of the Board of Tax Appeals have, if not explicitly, at least implicitly, rejected the idea that there is such a requirement. In Standard Envelope Manufacturing Co., 15 T. C. 41, where the taxpayer sold and subsequently leased back certain property, this Court, though regarding the sale and lease-back as “one interrelated transaction,” held that since the lease was for a term of less than 80 years, it therefore “was not the equivalent of a fee under the terms of section 29.112 (b) (1)-1 of Regulations 111.” In Midfield Oil Co., 39 B. T. A. 1154, the taxpayer contended that “the exchange of the Holmans oil and gas payment due out of oil and gas to be produced from the Mitchell lease for the Dawson overriding oil and gas royalty out of the Mitchell lease” was a nontaxable exchange of properties of like kind under section 112 (b) (1). The Mitchell lease had an area of 2.6 acres on which one producing oil well was situated. The Board held that the exchange was not nontaxable, simply on the ground that the rights were substantially different and not of like kind. The implication is that if the rights had been substantially similar, even though from the same lease on the same piece of property, the Board would have held the transaction to be an exchange of properties of like kind.

Petitioner cites Pembroke v. Helvering (CA-DC, 1934), 70 Fed. (2d) 850; Skemp v. Commissioner (CCA-7, 1948), 168 Fed. (2d) 598, and Imperator Realty Co., 24 B. T. A. 1010, to support his position that the transaction here was not an exchange. These cases are not applicable. In Pembroke v. Helvering, supra, the taxpayer leased certain real estate to a tenant for a term of 99 years at an annual rental.

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Bluebook (online)
15 T.C. 581, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/century-electric-co-v-commissioner-tax-1950.