Reichert v. Bankson

199 Ill. App. 95, 1916 Ill. App. LEXIS 162
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 17, 1916
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 199 Ill. App. 95 (Reichert v. Bankson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Reichert v. Bankson, 199 Ill. App. 95, 1916 Ill. App. LEXIS 162 (Ill. Ct. App. 1916).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Boggs

delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an action brought by appellants against appellee before a justice of the peace, for the recovery of certain rents. The trial before the justice resulted in a judgment in favor of appellee, whereupon an appeal was taken to the Circuit Court of Pulaski county where the cause was tried de novo by the court without a jury. Judgment was rendered in favor of appellee, from which judgment this appeal is prosecuted.

On December 17, 1910, Abner O. Bankson, father of appellee, with his wife, executed a mortgage to H. M. Britt, August Reichert, W. O. Smoot, O. E. Curt, M. T. Bagby, Charles H. Brown and William Schwartz upon two hundred acres of land in Pulaski county to secure the payment of a note for $5,000. Thereafter, said Britt became the sole owner of said note and mortgage and after the same fell due, brought suit to foreclose. A decree of foreclosure was rendered at the January term, 1913, of said court. The premises were sold under said decree to appellant August Reichert, to whom was issued a certificate of purchase. A one-third interest in this certificate was assigned to appellant M. T. Bagby, and another one-third interest was assigned to appellant W. A. Schwartz. The premises sold for $4,800, and a deficiency decree was awarded against said Abner C. Bankson for $1,429.13. The equity of redemption having expired on the 8th day of June, 1914, the special master on June 18,1914, deeded said premises to appellants. No question is raised as to the regularity of the above proceedings.

The possession of said premises during the period of the equity of redemption remained in said Abner C. Bankson and were rented by him to various tenants. Appellee, Hannon Bankson, rented forty acres of the premises for wheat, which was sowed in the fall of 1913. He was to pay one-third of the proceeds of the crop after taking out expenses of threshing and hauling to market, which said rent amounted to the sum of $190.29.

On June 19,1914, being the next day after receiving the master’s deed, appellants Schwartz and Reichert went to the home of Abner O. Bankson to inform the said Bankson that they had a deed and to see about the rent. It seems that appellants did not know at the time that the said Abner C. Bankson had rented said land to appellee. The wheat was afterwards threshed and when being hauled- to market, the appellant Schwartz went to appellee and demanded the rent. Appellee refused to give it to him, but said to him he would put it in the bank at Ullin and let the court say to whom it belonged. Appellee, thereafter, on the advice of counsel and.before the beginning of this suit, paid said rent to his father, Abner O. Bankson, the said mortgagor. Under the contract that Hannon Bankson had with his father, for the payment of the rent, the same was due when the wheat was sold and the expenses taken out. There is practically no controversy as to the facts 'in this case, but only as to the law applicable thereto. Appellants presented four propositions of law to the trial court which they contend should have been held, but which were refused.

The sole question to be determined in this case under the propositions of law passed upon by the trial court is whether the purchaser of premises under a foreclosure sale and who has received a deed, on the expiration of the period of redemption, has a right of action against a tenant in possession of said premises under a lease from the mortgagor made subsequent to the execution of the mortgage foreclosed, where no demand for possession of said premises has been made by such purchaser after receiving said deed, and where said tenant has not attorned to said purchaser as his tenant.

The trial court held on the hearing of said cause that the purchaser of the premises under the conditions above named had no right of action for rent against said tenant, and we are inclined to the opinion that the holding of the trial court was correct, and that the appellants in this case were not entitled to recover from the appellee for the proceeds of the rent wheat in question. Tiffany in his work on Landlord and Tenant, at page 876, in discussing this question says: “If the interest of the landlord is sold under a judgment, mortgage or other lien, which is subsequent to the lease, the purchaser becomes the landlord in the former owner’s place, since the reversion passes by the sale. In such case the purchaser takes only what the lessor has, that is, his estate in reversion, and the rights of the tenant under the outstanding lease remain such as they would be in the case of a voluntary transfer of the reversion. If, on the other hand, the premises are sold under a judgment, mortgage or other lien prior to the lease, the purchaser comes in by title paramount to the lease, and he is entitled to possession as against the tenant thereunder. And as the tenant under a lease has no rights in the land as against the purchaser under a prior incumbrance, so such purchaser has, apart from statute, no rights as landlord against such tenant, unless the latter accepts a new lease from the purchaser, or, which is the same thing, attorns to him. The purchaser’s title dates back to the date of the lien under which he claims, and he is in the same position towards the tenant under the lease as that in which one to whom the owner of land conveys the absolute title would be towards a tenant under a lease which such owner might make after thus divesting himself of the title, that is, he is an absolute stranger towards such tenant. The enforcement of the lien divests all intermediate estates and interests to the same extent as would the enforcement of a condition subsequent at common law. The courts occasionally lose sight of the above distinction between a sale under a prior and one under a subsequent lien, speaking of a purchaser under a prior lien as being entitled to the rent under the lease. It may be remarked that if the purchaser at the sale made to enforce such prior lien could be regarded as entitled to the rights of a reversioner as against the tenant, he would necessarily enjoy them subject to the same limitations as the lessor himself, and the result would be that the lien could be rendered practically valueless by the making of a long lease at an exceedingly low rent.”

This subject is also discussed in 24 Cyc. at page 1174. .The language being as follows: “If the lease is prior to the mortgage, the mortgagee is an assignee of the reversion and in that character entitled to all the rents, excepting only such as may have been paid by the lessee before notice of the assignment; but when the lease is subsequent to the mortgage, there is no privity between the mortgagee and the lessee, and no right in him to demand the rent reserved by the lease. ’ ’

In the case of Reed v. Bartlett, reported in the 9th Ill. App. at page 267, the court discussing this question on page 270 says: “When they, as owners of the equity of redemption, leased the premises to the appellee, his estate for years was carved out of the equity of redemption and .not out of the fee. The estate granted to the appellee, and the reversion in them constituted the entire .equity of redemption, and when the mortgage was foreclosed the equity of redemption became extinguished and the reversion and the leasehold estate fell with it.

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Bluebook (online)
199 Ill. App. 95, 1916 Ill. App. LEXIS 162, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/reichert-v-bankson-illappct-1916.