Overland Park Savings & Loan Ass'n v. Miller

763 P.2d 1092, 243 Kan. 730, 1988 Kan. LEXIS 196
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedOctober 28, 1988
DocketNo. 61,847
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 763 P.2d 1092 (Overland Park Savings & Loan Ass'n v. Miller) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Overland Park Savings & Loan Ass'n v. Miller, 763 P.2d 1092, 243 Kan. 730, 1988 Kan. LEXIS 196 (kan 1988).

Opinion

The opinion of the court was delivered by

McFarland, J.:

This is an action by a lending institution against individual guarantors of a corporate nonrecourse real estate development loan. The district court entered summary [731]*731judgments in favor of the defendant guarantors and the lending institution appeals therefrom.

The facts underlying this litigation are lengthy and complex but must be recited herein in considerable detail. To make their reading more meaningful it is helpful to state, at this point, the three primary grounds upon which the district court’s decision rests, as follows:

1. The guarantors were guaranteeing the legal obligations of the corporation. Inasmuch as the corporation’s failure to make loan payments as promised could result only in the loss of the security, the guarantors could not be liable for a money judgment for the corporation’s failure to make the payments;

2. whereas the original guaranty agreement of two of the defendants was specifically excepted from the nonrecourse provisions of the corporate loan, their subsequent guaranty agreement, made concurrently with the sale of the security and the loan assumption, was not — hence the second guaranty agreements were not so excepted; and

3. to permit the lending institution to sue the guarantors periodically for missed payments as opposed to resolution by foreclosure is not authorized by the contracts, would result in a multiplicity of actions, and is contrary to public policy. The case was presented to the district court on stipulations of

uncontroverted facts. These stipulations are quite comprehensive — covering all aspects of the pertinent transactions except for the specific negotiations leading to execution of the guaranty agreements replacing the original such agreements. The parties’ stipulations as to the cast of characters involved are as follows:

“Parties and Related Entities

“1. Defendant Hostetler is currently and has been for eight years, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the First Savings Bank of Manhattan, Kansas (formerly First National Bank of Manhattan, Kansas, and hereinafter the ‘First Bank of Manhattan’). He has been a member of that Board for 14 years, is an officer of the bank and he or his family owns virtually 100% of the First Bank of Manhattan. Defendant Hostetler obtained a law degree from the University of Kansas, but has never practiced law. He has had limited real estate experience, including experience in agricultural and commercial real estate.

“2. Defendant Lashbrook is currently and has been for approximately three years the President of First National Bank of [732]*732Overland Park, Kansas. Prior to that time, he was President of First Bank of Manhattan for nine years, which Bank is a major tenant of The First Bank Center at issue herein and at which Bank defendant Hostetler is Chairman of the Board of Directors.

“3. Defendant Miller is a certified public accountant and a partner in the accounting firm of Miller, Nelson & Company. Miller has been involved in general accounting and financial tax consulting. His accounting clients include real estate brokers, commercial and residential real estate developers and syndicates and purchasers of real estate. He is and has been personally involved in the real estate development, including the Stillwell Crossing Subdivision development.

“4. Plaintiff Overland Park Savings & Loan Association (hereinafter ‘OPS&L’) is a federally chartered savings and loan association doing business in the State of Kansas with its principal place of business at 9400 Antioch, Overland Park, Kansas. Plaintiff has a branch office at 7810 151st Street at 69 Highway, Overland Park, Kansas.

“5. Dee-Kay Developers, Inc. is a Kansas corporation principally owned and operated by defendant Miller.

“6. H & L Investments was, at the time of the transactions involved herein a Kansas General Partnership consisting of defendants Hostetler and Lashbrook as general partners. The only asset of the partnership was the shopping complex in Manhattan, Kansas, commonly known as The First Bank Center, which is the subject of this action.”

The district court’s pertinent findings of fact are as follows:

“3. In 1984, H & L Investments entered into negotiations with OPS&L for a loan which H & L intended to use to develop the First Bank Center.

“4. The land upon which the Center is built was owned in fee simple by the First Bank of Manhattan, a bank owned almost entirely by the defendant Hostetler and his family.

“The First Bank of Manhattan leased the real estate to H & L Investments for the purpose of building a shopping center.

“5. On December 7,1984, OPS&L loaned 1.2 million dollars to H & L for use in building First Bank Center, a multi-tenant commercial shopping center.

“6. The basic terms of the note were for monthly payments of $14,123.53 from January 1, 1985 to December 1, 1995. On De[733]*733cember 1,1995, a balloon payment for the balance would be due. Interest was fixed at 13.9% per annum.

“7. The promissory note executed by H & L was secured by a mortgage on the First Bank Center. The mortgage was duly executed by H & L and the First Bank of Manhattan, which held fee simple title to the land.

“8. Three clauses of the promissory note lie at the heart of this controversy: the prepayment clause, the default clause, and the non-recourse clause.

“9. The prepayment clause provides as follows:

‘The Maker hereby reserves the privilege to prepay all or any portion of the principal of this Note; the penalty for prepayment shall be the amount by which 13.9% is greater than the weekly average yield on United States Treasury securities adjusted to a constant maturity of one year plus 250 basis points on the date for prepayment multiplied by the number of years remaining to maturity (rounded to nearest .01 years) multiplied by the amount of prepayment; provided, however, that any such prepayment shall be applied first to then accrued but unpaid interest due on this Note, and the balance of any such prepayment shall be applied in reduction of principal thereunder.’

“10. The purpose of such a prepayment clause is to protect the lender from fluctuations in the interest market. Essentially, the banking institution borrows money from other, larger lenders, and then in turn loans it to the ultimate borrowers at interest rates which are slightly higher than the rate being paid by the banking institution. The difference between the two interest rates (i.e., the bank’s and the borrower’s) is the margin of profit from which the bank pays its operating expenses and makes it[s] profit.

“When a bank loans a large sum of money such as this for a lengthy period of time, it protects itself by a prepayment clause, because the interest rate it is paying to its lender is locked in at the rate at which it borrowed from its lender. Should interest rates fall, the ultimate borrower would naturally refinance at the lower interest rate, and prepay its loan to the bank. In that event, the bank would have to loan the money to new borrowers at the current, lower interest rate, but the bank would still be locked into paying its lender at the higher rate. The prepayment penal-

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Bluebook (online)
763 P.2d 1092, 243 Kan. 730, 1988 Kan. LEXIS 196, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/overland-park-savings-loan-assn-v-miller-kan-1988.