Hamlin v. Hamlin

352 P.3d 737, 271 Or. App. 647, 2015 Ore. App. LEXIS 737
CourtCourt of Appeals of Oregon
DecidedJune 10, 2015
DocketC115274CV; A153464
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 352 P.3d 737 (Hamlin v. Hamlin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Oregon primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hamlin v. Hamlin, 352 P.3d 737, 271 Or. App. 647, 2015 Ore. App. LEXIS 737 (Or. Ct. App. 2015).

Opinion

LAGESEN, P. J.

This case arises out of a family dispute regarding the parties’ deceased mother’s intent in deeding an interest in her house to her son (defendant). The trial court found that, in conveying the interest in the house to defendant, the parties’ mother intended defendant to hold the property in trust for the beneficiaries of her will, including her daughter (plaintiff) and defendant. Based on that finding, the trial court entered a judgment that, among other things, declared that defendant held the house as trustee of a resulting trust for the benefit of the beneficiaries of the parties’ mother’s will.1 On appeal from that judgment, defendant assigns error to the trial court’s finding that the parties’ mother intended that defendant would hold the property in trust, arguing that the trial court erred by considering evidence extrinsic to the deed conveying the property to defendant and, in particular, by considering evidence of defendant’s conduct after the parties’ mother had executed the deed to defendant, in reaching that finding. Defendant further contends that that evidence — even if properly admitted — is insufficient to support the trial court’s factual finding that the parties’ mother had transferred the property to defendant to hold in trust for the beneficiaries of her will. We affirm, concluding that the trial court permissibly considered evidence extrinsic to the deed, including evidence of defendant’s conduct subsequent to the execution of the deed, in determining whether defendant’s mother conveyed the property to him to hold in trust.2 We further conclude that the evidence in the record is sufficient to support the trial court’s finding that the parties’ mother intended for defendant to hold the property for the benefit of her estate’s beneficiaries.

Plaintiff and defendant are sister and brother. After their father died in 2002, plaintiff and the parties’ mother, Joan, had numerous conversations about Joan’s estate, including the family home and Joan’s bank accounts. [650]*650In those conversations, Joan indicated to plaintiff that she wanted to have the property transfer smoothly to her heirs upon her death outside of the probate process. Joan discussed with plaintiff the necessity of putting one of her children on both the title to the house and the accounts in order to accomplish that goal. Joan first asked if she could put plaintiffs name on both the title and the accounts; however, plaintiff recommended putting defendant’s name on the property because defendant, unlike plaintiff, lived in the area. Plaintiff understood that the purpose of putting the house in defendant’s name was “ease of transfer” when Joan passed away and that the transfer would occur “according to [Joan’s] will.”

In September 2005, Joan executed a bargain-and-sale deed, conveying, as grantor, “Lot 55, EMERALD ESTATES, No. 2, Washington County, State of Oregon” to herself and defendant, as grantees. On the title company’s “Application for Exemption from Washington County Transfer Tax” form, under the “Required Information” heading, Joan completed the section under the subheading “If transfer is a Gift” (rather than the section under the subheading “If transfer is by devise or inheritance”). Both Joan and defendant signed that form, as well as a “Settlement Statement” that listed Joan and defendant as the “buyers.” The deed did not specify that Joan and defendant would hold the property jointly with a right of survivorship. Plaintiff was not present when the deed was executed, although Joan later told her that she had put defendant on the title to the house and on Joan’s bank accounts.

Joan died in October 2008. Because the bargain- and-sale deed did not state that the 2005 conveyance to defendant had been with a right of survivorship, upon Joan’s death, the deed, as written, had the effect of transferring a one-half undivided interest in the residence to Joan’s estate, subject to probate, and a one-half undivided interest to defendant not subject to probate, although Joan’s intention in putting defendant on the deed to the house had been to avoid probate.

Upon Joan’s death, defendant initially behaved as if he held the house in trust for the beneficiaries of Joan’s [651]*651estate. Defendant began cleaning, repairing, and painting the premises, using funds from Joan’s bank account that was now titled in his name. Defendant also used that account to pay the property’s bills.3 In May or June of 2009, when the home was ready to be put on the market, defendant approached plaintiff about moving into the house himself. Plaintiff agreed that defendant could move into the house, but required that defendant agree to sign a lease and pay a nominal rent.

Initially, defendant consented to those conditions. In early July, when defendant was starting to move in, plaintiff sent him the lease agreement. Defendant did not, however, sign the lease at that time. By late July or early August, plaintiff had calculated an appropriate rental amount for defendant: $750 per month, half of the market rental value of the house, given the minor repairs and maintenance that defendant would continue to undertake. Defendant did not, either then or at any point thereafter, tender a rent payment to the estate. The estate continued to pay both the home insurance and property taxes.

Around that time, plaintiff and defendant had their first conversation about the possibility of defendant purchasing the house from the estate. Defendant expressed anger at the prospect that he would need to mortgage the property in order to purchase it in full from the estate. In late fall of 2009, defendant began to assert that Joan had conveyed the house to him as a gift and had not intended for defendant to hold the property in trust for the other beneficiaries of Joan’s will.

After defendant began to claim that Joan had given him the property outright and to disclaim that he held the property in trust for the benefit of Joan’s beneficiaries, plaintiff, acting in her capacity as personal representative of her mother’s estate, initiated this action for declaratory relief, seeking a declaration that defendant holds title to the home in a resulting trust for the benefit of himself, plaintiff, [652]*652and the other beneficiaries of Joan’s will. In the alternative, plaintiff requested a declaration that defendant holds the property in a constructive trust for the benefit of himself, plaintiff, and the other beneficiaries of Joan’s will. In his answer, defendant denied that Joan had transferred the property to him in trust, alleging that Joan had transferred the property to him as a gift and, beyond that, that Joan had intended for the transfer of interest to defendant to include a right of survivorship so that, upon Joan’s death, full title of the property would transfer to defendant. Defendant counterclaimed for reformation, requesting that the trial court reform the deed to specify that Joan’s 2005 conveyance of the property to herself and defendant was with a right of survivorship and to “reflect the intent of Joan E. Hamlin, that defendant Patrick L. Hamlin would be the sole owner of the property upon the death of Joan E. Hamlin.”

At trial, the parties agreed that Joan had transferred the property to defendant with the objective of avoiding probate and that the deed’s omission of a specification that defendant’s interest in the property was with “right of survivorship” was a mistake that needed to be corrected through reformation of the deed.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
352 P.3d 737, 271 Or. App. 647, 2015 Ore. App. LEXIS 737, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hamlin-v-hamlin-orctapp-2015.