Childs v. Childs

199 N.E. 383, 293 Mass. 67, 1935 Mass. LEXIS 1304
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court·Decided December 31, 1935·Published·Cited by 31 cases

Opinion

Field, J.

This is a suit in equity. It was brought by the plaintiff in 1929 against her then husband J. Arthur [68] Childs, hereinafter referred to as the defendant, and two other persons, obligees of a bond given by the plaintiff and the defendant, to require the defendant to account for money received by him from said obligees. Many of the allegations of the bill were admitted by the defendant’s answer, including an allegation that on March 3, 1923, the plaintiff and the defendant executed and delivered to the obligees “a bond for a deed” of certain real estate, a copy of which bond is annexed to the bill. Material portions of this bond are set forth in the margin.* The case was referred to a master who filed a report on December 12, 1934, which was confirmed by an interlocutory decree on June 28, 1935. And on the date of this decree a motion by the plaintiff was allowed, after hearing, to amend the bill by adding thereto an allegation that on October 5, 1934, a decree was entered granting to the plaintiff a divorce from the defendant and “the said divorce became absolute” on April 6, 1935. This allegation was not denied and the case was argued on the basis that it was true. A final decree was entered ordering the defendant to pay to the plaintiff the sum of $1,047.86 with interest amounting to $349.29, and costs, and the defendant appealed therefrom.

[69] The master made these findings: The plaintiff and the defendant were wife and husband having been married in 1903. They purchased the premises in question on May 19, 1908. "The deed conveying the property was signed by Augustus S. Furtado and in the consideration clause it was declared that the consideration was paid by ‘ J. Arthur Childs and E. Maude Childs, husband and wife.’ In the granting clause it was conveyed to 'J. Arthur Childs and E. Maude Childs.’ In the habendum clause I find 'J. Arthur Childs and E. Maude Childs as joint tenants in joint tenancy and to the survivor of them.’ I find that the . . . [defendant] held in joint tenancy and not as tenant in the entirety if the said finding be material. On March 3, 1923, the parties hereto entered into a contract to convey the land for the sum of $4,000.00 to a Mr. and Mrs. Kydd. The bond called for a conveyance on payment of the said principal and interest that might accrue thereon until said money was paid.”

From March 3, 1923, up to and including September 1, 1928, the defendant "collected on the principal and interest due on unpaid balances of the principal the sum of $2194.67 and . . . after January 8, 1929 he received on the principal and interest accrued the further sum of $491.86 making a total received up to March 1, 1930 of $2686.53.” The master made findings in regard to amounts paid out by the defendant for taxes and interest on a mortgage on the real estate in question. And he found that the defendant "never rendered an account” to the plaintiff and "upon demand refused to pay any of the money collected from the premises,” and that of the total amount received by the defendant “he should be credited with payments of $610.80 leaving a balance of $2085.73 [$2,075.73?], one half of which, namely, $1047.86 [$1,037.86?] is due and payable” to the plaintiff.

The plaintiff is not entitled to relief in this suit on the facts established.

The plaintiff and the defendant were tenants by entire-ties of the real estate at the time the bond to convey it was given by them to the obligees of the bond. The language [70] of the deed by which this real estate was conveyed to the plaintiff and' her husband by a third person indicates that joint ownership thereof with survivorship, that is, some form of joint tenancy, and not a tenancy in common was intended. Hoag v. Hoag, 213 Mass. 50, 53. Moreover, since the grantees were husband and wife presumably a tenancy by entireties was created, though an ordinary joint tenancy could have been created if the intention to do so clearly appeared in the deed. Ames v. Chandler, 265 Mass. 428, 432. Splaine v. Morrissey, 282 Mass. 217, 221. But no such intention is shown by the deed as described by the master. Neither the granting clause nor the clause reciting payment of the consideration purports to define the estate created except as the látter recognizes the existence of the marital relation by describing the defendant and the plaintiff as “husband and wife.” And the habendum clause limiting the estate to the plaintiff and the defendant “as joint tenants in joint tenancy and to the survivor of them, ” though sufficient to rebut the presumption of a tenancy in common, is not sufficient in a deed from a third person to rebut the presumption of a modified form of joint tenancy which is a tenancy by entireties. Hoag v. Hoag, 213 Mass. 50, 53-54. See Bernatavicius v. Bernatavicius, 259 Mass. 486, 487. Compare Ames v. Chandler, 265 Mass. 428. The finding of the master that the defendant “held in joint tenancy and not as tenant in the entirety” is incompatible with the master’s findings as to the terms of the deed. Hayward v. Cain, 110 Mass. 273, 279. Compare Splaine v. Morrissey, 282 Mass. 217, 222-223.

The estate by entireties of the plaintiff and the defendant in the real estate in question was not destroyed or severed before the divorce of the plaintiff and the defendant, which took effect after this suit was brought. Doubtless by conveyance of the real estate to a third person by a deed in which the plaintiff and the defendant joined the estate by entireties in such real estate could have been terminated. Bernatavicius v. Bernatavicius, 259 Mass. 486, 487. But there was no such conveyance prior to the divorce. Though the bond, executed years before the divorce, contemplated [71] such a conveyance of the real estate in the future, no conveyance, so far as appears, was ever made. And the giving of the bond did not change the quality of the estate of the plaintiff and the defendant in the real estate. They remained tenants by entireties until they were divorced and then became tenants in common. Bernatavicius v. Bernatavicius, 259 Mass. 486, 490. While they were tenants by entireties the defendant was entitled to possession of the real estate and to the rents and profits thereof, though he could not convey the real estate so as to bind the plaintiff or destroy her right of survivorship without her consent. Peter v. Sacker, 271 Mass. 383, 385, and cases cited. Prior to the divorce, therefore, the plaintiff was not entitled either to possession of the real estate or to the rents and profits thereof.

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Childs v. Childs, 199 N.E. 383, 293 Mass. 67, 1935 Mass. LEXIS 1304 (Mass. 1935).

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