Vandivier v. Daviess

54 S.W.2d 32, 245 Ky. 677, 1932 Ky. LEXIS 658
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976)
DecidedNovember 4, 1932
StatusPublished

This text of 54 S.W.2d 32 (Vandivier v. Daviess) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976) primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Vandivier v. Daviess, 54 S.W.2d 32, 245 Ky. 677, 1932 Ky. LEXIS 658 (Ky. 1932).

Opinion

Opinion op the Court by

Judge Perry —

Reversing.

This appeal is prosecuted from a judgment of the Mercer circuit court, overruling appellant’s exceptions to the admission of alleged incompetent evidence and refusal to admit alleged competent evidence and also appellant’s exceptions to the report of the commissioners filed in appellant’s suit in equity against M. M. Daviess for the dissolution and settlement of their real estate partnership and to obtain an accounting by and a recovery against appellee of his share of said certain parternership property, funds, and profits alleged to be wrongfully withheld by Daviess.

The facts appear by the record to be that the appellant, William Yandivier, and appellee, M. M. Daviess, hereinafter referred to as plaintiff and defendant respectively, were, prior to their assumption of the partnership relations involved in this controversy, friends and residents of Harrodsburg, Ky., where, previous to this matter, they had handled some investment transactions as partners.

By the pleadings and proof herein, it is alleged and shown that in January, 1924, the plaintiff, Yandivier, went to Miami, Fla., when that section was enjoying a hectic boom in its real estate market and that, attracted as an investor there, he soon joined the crowd of eager investors by purchasing for cash, at a price of some $6,000, from one Alonzo Riley, lots 7 and 8 of Brickell’s addition to Miami, Fla.; that shortly after purchasing the lots, he borrowed from the--Trust Company in Miami the sum of $18,000, with which to *679 erect an apartment building upon lot 8, and secured said loan by a mortgage on the lots and on the improvements to be erected therewith thereon.

Pursuant to this plan, he did erect at a cost of some $18,000 an apartment building containing some twelve apartments on the lot.

In the following February, the defendant Daviess came to Miami and, on seeing the development being made by plaintiff, requested that he sell him his adjoining lot 7, which he did at a cash price of some $3,500 or $4,000, upon which defendant at once also began and completed the construction of an apartment building similar to the one on lot 7 at a like cost of some $18,000, paid therefor by defendant out of his individual means.

These two apartments thus constructed by them were named and are hereinafter referred to as the “Blue Grass Apartments.”

About the time of the completion of these buildings, at any rate, prior to June, 1925, plaintiff and defendant decided that they would enter into a partnership in the OAvnership and handling of these Blue Grass Apartments and also in the purchase and sale of other Florida lots and real estate. This agreement was made orally between them and was to continue for no definite time. Title to the Blue Grass Apartments remained in the plaintiff Vandivier.

Shortly thereafter, it appears they bought lots 9 and 10 adjoining their apartments, which at the time were encumbered by a vendor’s lien of some $4,700 and that title to these lots were taken in defendant’s name. Also it appears that the parties, acting as partners, bought and sold a number of other Florida lots as well as buying individually several other properties.

Later, it appears, in the fall of 1924, Vandivier secured a Mrs. Yates as a purchaser for the Blue Grass Apartments at a cost of $95,000, under which contract she took deed and possession therefor the following January, and by the terms of the purchase contract of these apartments at $95,000, she executed a series of six notes, each in the amount of $9,500 with interest at 8 per cent, from date and payable respectively in one to six years on and from January, 1926. She also assumed plaintiff’s outstanding mortgage of $18,000 upon *680 the apartment building erected by him on lot 8, assigned two lien notes referred to in the record as “McDougle notes” each for $5,000, and made cash payment off $10,000.

It appears that she later also purchased the adjoining lots 9 and 10 hereinbefore mentioned.

It appears that Mrs. Yates paid only one, or the first, of these series of six purchase-money notes and some $3,000 in interest upon the $18,000 mortgage of plaintiff assumed by her in part payment of her purchase price for the property.

It appears that the business of this partnership was managed and looked after by ■ the plaintiff, who, while owning and operating a grain and feed business at his home in Harrodsburg, yet spent his winters in Florida looking after the matters of this real estate partnership, giving his time and service in the supervision of its affairs while paying his own expenses incurred while so doing.

It also appears that the defendant, M. M. Daviess, was the capitalist of the firm, who furnished the investment funds called for in handling the real estate transactions undertaken, though giving little time or personal attention to the management of the partnership, but remaining at his home in Harrodsburg, there looking after matters of his individual concern and business.

It further appears that the partnership of the parties operated rather actively and extensively during the first year after its formation, with the result that by the summer of 1925 it held over $100,000 of Florida lots or land lien notes acquired in the course of their various partnership transactions in real estate investments.

All went smoothly and satisfactorily, it appears, with the firm and a harmonious relationship existed between the partners during the golden days of the boom, when all the lien notes held by the partnership were regarded as of full face value and their paper profits showed a gratifying result of their firm business. Later, however, with the collapse of this prosperous era and when properties were turned back on the sellers’ hands and 'when equities and values held under junior liens, until then considered real and substantial, became *681 worthless, friction and suspicion arose between these partners as to what were their several rights and interest in the partnership property and paper profits.

Mrs. Yates, the purchaser of the Blue Grass Apartments, after having made the cash payment of $10,000 and the payment of her first note for $9,500 and a payment of $3,000 upon the assumed $18,000 mortgage and some other interest, defaulted in the payment of the balance owing upon her purchase debt, whereupon foreclosure proceedings were instituted against her and the Blue Grass Apartments and also lots 9 and 10, upon which she had also defaulted in payment of the purchase price thereupon, were foreclosed and sold at public auction. The apartments were bidden in at. some $35,000 and title taken thereto in defendant’s name, while that of the unimproved lots 9 and 10 was taken in the name of the plaintiff. It appears that the firm’s equity in the latter lots was later released upon foreclosure proceedings had upon the senior purchase-money lien against same.

It further appears that, after the Blue Grass Apartments were recovered upon foreclosure proceedings, they were looked after and rented out for a while by the plaintiff and associate manager, Mr.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
54 S.W.2d 32, 245 Ky. 677, 1932 Ky. LEXIS 658, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/vandivier-v-daviess-kyctapphigh-1932.