Smith v. Nrc, Incorp.

574 S.W.2d 639, 1978 Tex. App. LEXIS 4076
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedDecember 20, 1978
DocketNo. 12727
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 574 S.W.2d 639 (Smith v. Nrc, Incorp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Smith v. Nrc, Incorp., 574 S.W.2d 639, 1978 Tex. App. LEXIS 4076 (Tex. Ct. App. 1978).

Opinion

ON SECOND MOTION FOR REHEARING

SHANNON, Justice.

The opinion of this Court filed on November 15, 1978, is withdrawn, and the following opinion replaces it.

Appellants Warren H. Smith and Helen W. Smith, husband and wife, sued appellee NRC, Incorporated, in the district court of Travis County seeking rescission of an executed contract for deed to a lot. The district court entered a take-nothing judgment.

Appellants were residents of Dallas, and wished to build a retirement house near Austin. Appellee interested appellants in its subdivision located on Lake Travis. In May, 1973, the parties signed a contract for deed to purchase lot # 23052 in appellee’s subdivision for $25,700. Appellants obtained a deed to the lot in August, 1973.

Lot # 23052 fronts on Lake Travis and is subject to an easement previously granted to the Lower Colorado River Authority enabling the Authority to inundate the property up to the 715-foot contour line. Lot # 23052 is entirely below the 715-foot contour line, and if the Authority chose to exercise its rights under the overflow easement the lot would be completely under water.

At all times material appellee knew that the lot was below the 715-foot contour line and subject to the overflow easement. No agent of appellee told appellants of the easement. Neither the contract for deed nor appellee’s advertising brochures referred to the overflow easement. At the time the contract for deed was executed, appellants were furnished a document entitled, “Declaration of Reservations Highland Lake Estates . . .’’On page eight at paragraph nineteen of that instrument there appeared the following statement:

[641]*641 “LCRA Overflow Easement:
The Lower Colorado River Authority holds an easement to innundate [sic ] and overflow any portion of the subdivision lying below the contour line 715 feet above sea level. Any such areas shall be subject to such easement, and all structures and improvements therein shall be constructed so as to accommodate any such innundation [sic] or overflow in a fashion approved by the Architectural Committee.” (Emphasis added)

The overflow easement was shown specifically in the policy of title insurance which appellants received several weeks after the contract for deed was executed. Smith testified that he did not learn of the easement until about two years after he signed the contract for deed. Smith could not determine the contour line of his lot short of a survey.

Appellants pleaded fraud as basis for rescission. In support of their fraud allegation, appellants alleged affirmative misrepresentations of fact. Nevertheless, upon trial, without objection, appellants were permitted to prove facts tending to show appellee’s failure to disclose a material fact affecting the value of the lot. As a result, the issue of concealment or failure to disclose was tried by consent. Texas R.Civ.P. 67.

The district court found, among other things, that appellee did not “conceal or fail to disclose” the overflow easement for the reason that: (1) the easement was disclosed in the above quoted “Declaration of Reservations” furnished appellants at the time of purchase and (2) the easement was specifically disclosed in the policy of title insurance furnished appellants with the deed to the lot. The court found further that a person of ordinary intelligence, in the exercise of reasonable diligence, would have been placed on notice by the disclosure of the easement in the “Declaration of Reservations” that the flood easement might affect the lot in question.

The court concluded that appellants . . failed to prove the elements of actionable fraud to invoke the remedy of rescission . . . ”

By entry of the mentioned findings of fact, the district court necessarily followed the rule that the vendor is under a duty to disclose material facts which would not be discoverable by the exercise of ordinary care and diligence or which a reasonable investigation and inquiry would not uncover. Weintraub v. Krobatsch, 64 N.J. 445, 317 A.2d 68 (1974); Obde v. Schlemeyer, 56 Wash.2d 449, 353 P.2d 672 (1960); Sorrell v. Young, 6 Wash.App. 220, 491 P.2d 1312 (1971); Keeton, Rights of Disappointed Purchasers, 32 Texas L.Rev. 1 (1953). The parties do not complain of the rule of law by which the court determined the clause.1

Appellants’ important points of error are:
(1) “The trial judge erred in concluding that NRC did not conceal and failed to disclose the fact that the lot was totally encompassed by an overflow easement in favor of the Lower Colorado River Authority”; and
(2) “The trial judge erred in concluding that a person of ordinary intelligence' would be placed on notice that the overflow easement might affect the lot in question by the disclosure in the statement of reservations.”

Appellants’ points of error, standing alone, do not indicate whether appellants are complaining that there was “no evidence” or that there was “insufficient evidence” to support the court’s findings. Further analysis is required. The controlling consideration in ascertaining the character of a point of error directed at the state of the evidence is not whether the point uses the preferable, or even the proper, terminology, but instead is whether the point is based upon and related to a particular procedural step in the trial and appellate process and is a proper predicate for the relief sought in the appellate court. Cal[642]*642vert, “No Evidence” and “Insufficient Evidence” Points of Error, 38 Texas L.Rev. 361, 362 (1960).

In this case, the trial was to the court and appellants’ points are not based upon and related to. any particular step in the trial. With respect to the relief sought, appellants’ only specific prayer in the brief is that this Court reverse the judgment and render judgment rescinding the contract. “No evidence” points are points which call for reversal of a trial court’s judgment and rendition of judgment for appellant. “Insufficient evidence” points of error are those which call for a reversal of the trial court’s judgment and remand of the cause for retrial. Calvert, “No Evidence” and “Insufficient Evidence” Points of Error, supra.

Appellants’ points of error are “no evidence” points, Wisdom v. Smith, 146 Tex. 420, 209 S.W.2d 164 (1948), which necessarily assert that all of the evidence showed that (1) appellee concealed or failed to disclose the overflow easement and (2) a person of ordinary intelligence, in the exercise of ordinary care, would not have been placed on notice by the disclosure in the Declaration of Reservations that the flood easement might affect the lot. Because appellants filed no points of error complaining of insufficient evidence, we have no jurisdiction to pass upon that question. Wisdom v. Smith, supra.

Appellants recognize, of course, the existence in evidence of the title policy setting out the overflow easement and the disclosure contained in the Declaration of Reservations.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Smith v. National Resort Communities, Inc.
585 S.W.2d 655 (Texas Supreme Court, 1979)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
574 S.W.2d 639, 1978 Tex. App. LEXIS 4076, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/smith-v-nrc-incorp-texapp-1978.