McCarty v. Sheets

391 N.E.2d 834, 181 Ind. App. 208, 1979 Ind. App. LEXIS 1475

Opinions

STATON, Judge.

Carl A. Sheets and Anna L. Sheets owned a garage which extended some 1.4 feet to 2 feet beyond their title property line. Russell McCarty sued to compel Sheets to move the garage. Sheets counterclaimed for quiet title. The trial court found against McCarty in his suit, and found for Sheets on the counterclaim. McCarty appeals. We affirm.

I.

Negative Judgment

McCarty first contests the judgment of the trial court which denied him relief on his complaint. He argues that the judgment is contrary to the evidence. Such an argument presents no error because he is appealing from a negative judgment. See Hiatt v. Yergin (1972), 152 Ind.App. 497, 284 N.E.2d 834; see also Link v. Sun Oil Co. (1974), 160 Ind.App. 310, 312 N.E.2d 126; Sekerez v. Bd. of Sanitary Comm’rs (1974), 160 Ind.App. 13, 309 N.E.2d 460, 312 N.E.2d 98; Inkoff v. Inkoff (1974), 159 Ind.App. 239, 306 N.E.2d 132; Lindenborg v. M & L Builders (1973), 158 Ind.App. 311, 302 N.E.2d 816; Jameson v. McCaffry (1973), 157 Ind.App. 480, 300 N.E.2d 889.

II.

Counterclaim- — Quiet Title

Title was quieted in Sheets. The court awarded a total of four feet and two inches of uniform width along Sheets’ west property line. McCarty asserts that such an award was erroneous in that even if Sheets had obtained title, by adverse possession, to the land upon which the garage was standing, the evidence does not support any award of more land.

It will facilitate discussion to illustrate the relative positions of the contiguous fees.

As can be seen from the sketch, the garage in dispute extends beyond Sheets’ surveyed property line. (The sketch represents the property as surveyed in 1973.) The eaves of the garage extend one foot beyond the garage itself. McCarty purchased his property on January 14, 1967. Sheets had purchased their property on June 7, 1956. Evidence was admitted that at least the front portion of the Sheets’ garage had been in its present location since before 1937.

Carl Sheets testified that he had mowed to the middle line between his garage and McCarty’s garage. He “maintained it, protected it, cut dock out of it, thistles, and would rake the leaves off of it” continuously, from the time he took possession up to the present. He stated that he paid all taxes as they were assessed against his property. No one questioned the location of the garage until 1973 when McCarty complained about water damage from rain flow from Sheets’ garage roof. One thing led to another, and McCarty had the property surveyed. Sheets paid half of the cost of the survey. When the survey was completed, Sheets attempted to conciliate by offering to erect eave troughs; Sheets even offered to pay McCarty for the disputed strip. McCarty remained adamant that Sheets must get his garage off of McCarty’s property; McCarty then sued.

Despite any pacification efforts by Sheets, the evidence does support the trial court’s judgment that Sheets already owned the disputed property, through adverse possession, at the time the controversy congealed. In Rennert v. Shirk (1904), 163 Ind. 542, 551, 72 N.E. 546, 549, it was held:

“In this State, when an owner of land, by mistake as to the boundary line of his land, takes actual, visible, and exclusive possession of another’s land and holds it as his own continuously for the “statutory period of twenty years, he thereby acquires the title as against the real owner. The possession is regarded as adverse, without reference to the fact that it is based on mistake; it being prima facie sufficient that actual, visible, and exclusive possession is taken under a claim of right.” (Citations omitted.)

The twenty-year possessory period necessary to acquire title by adverse possession, extant at the time of the Court’s disposition of Rennert, was shortened to a period of ten years by the legislature in 1951. IC 1971, 34-1-2-2(6), Ind.Ann.Stat. § 2-602 (Burns Code Ed.).

Sheets had owned the property since 1956. He had therefore acquired title to the disputed strip of land by 1967, when McCarty purchased the adjoining property.

Furthermore, the evidence clearly established that the position of the garage had remained unchanged since 1937. Periods of adverse possession can be tacked, from grantor to grantee. Ft. Wayne Sm. & Ref. Wks. v. City of Ft. Wayne (1938), 214 Ind. 454, 14 N.E.2d 556; Smith v. Brown (1956), 126 Ind.App. 545, 134 N.E.2d 823. The testimony of a neighbor supported the reasonable inference that Sheets’ predecessors in title had occupied the disputed strip in much the same way that Sheets occupied it. Since Sheets’ right to the property was established by adverse possession even before McCarty bought the adjoining property, it was immaterial whether Sheets participated in the survey or offered to buy the disputed strip. See Rennert v. Shirk, supra; Rosenmeier v. Mahrenholz (1913), 179 Ind. 467, 101 N.E. 721; Grim v. Johns (1916), 61 Ind.App. 514, 112 N.E. 13.

McCarty argues that the mistaken boundary cases have relied upon a physical manifestation of the boundary: a fence or shrubs. It is true that there is no direct evidence of such a symbolic, concrete division in this case. However, we are faced with the uncontroverted evidence that McCarty purchased the property in 1967 and did not even raise the question of boundary until 1973. Sheets himself had established his habits as to maintenance and mowing for at least eleven years before McCarty purchased the neighboring fee. Under the circumstances of this case, we do not believe that the absence of a fence or shrub should defeat Sheets’ adverse title. We look only to the evidence or inferences which support the judgment of the trial court. Haynes v. Brown (1949), 120 Ind. App. 184, 88 N.E.2d 795. The trier of facts is free to consider all circumstances which might in any way affect credibility of evidence. Hays v. Hartfield L-P Gas (1974), 159 Ind.App. 297, 306 N.E.2d 373.

The trial court quieted title in Sheets to four feet two inches of property beyond his surveyed property line. The four feet two inches was intended to “give to [Sheets] the land located between the garage of [Sheets] and the garage of [McCarty] to a point half way between said buildings . . . .” There was evidence to support this judgment. We affirm.

BUCHANAN, C. J. (by designation), concurs. HOFFMAN, J., dissents with opinion.