Wilson v. Hayes-Lucas Lumber Co.

207 N.W. 155, 49 S.D. 341, 1926 S.D. LEXIS 34
CourtSouth Dakota Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 8, 1926
DocketFile No. 5666
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 207 N.W. 155 (Wilson v. Hayes-Lucas Lumber Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering South Dakota Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wilson v. Hayes-Lucas Lumber Co., 207 N.W. 155, 49 S.D. 341, 1926 S.D. LEXIS 34 (S.D. 1926).

Opinion

SHERWOOD, J.

A motion to dismiss this appeal appears in respondent’s brief, but not otherwise; no waiver or order, to show cause is anywhere found in the record. The motion fails to comply with rule 21 of the Rules of this court, and cannot be considered. State v. Board of Commissioners, 29 S. D. 358, 137 N. W. 354; Neilson v. C. & N. W. Ry. Co., 27 S. D. 96, 129 N. W. 907.

This is an action brought by the owner of land, who claims his title through the foreclosure of a purchase-money mortgage, [343]*343to restrain the sale of the buildings on the land under an execution issued on a decree obtained on the foreclosure of a mechanic’s lien for the material furnished in the erection of such buildings.

Judgment was for the defendant, Hayes-Lucas Lumber Company, a corporation, hereinafter called the lumber company, authorizing the sale and removal of the buildings, and plaintiff appeals. The appeal is from the judgment alone. No bill of exceptions was settled. Appellant in his six assignments of error has challenged all the conclusions of law made by the trial court. This requires an examination of all the findings of fact. These findings are very lengthy, covering twenty pages of the abstract; a brief summary of all of them is necessary to an understanding of the case.

The trial court found, in substance, as follows: That, during December, 1917, Frank Smith (one of these defendants) had an interest in a half section of land near Lane, S. D., with authority to sell the same. The land was without buildings, and Jonas Jonassen (another defendant) agreed to buy on condition Smith would furnish him money wherewith he might erect a house, barn, and other buildings on the land. Smith agreed to furnish Jonas-sen this money to the amount of $3,000 and take a third mortgage on the land for it. On this assurance and agreement, Jonassen agreed to buy the land. The size and character of the buildings and the place on the land where they were to be erected was agreed on between them. During January, 1918, and before the sale was consummated, Smith and Jonas and Bertha Jonassen, his wife, went together to the yard of the Hayes-Lucas Lumber Company, at Lane, and advised the managing agent of the agreement that had been made between Smith and Jonassen, and inquired if lumber could be had from the lumber company to erect the improvements on these premises. Smith then stated to said company that he would furnish money to Jonassen to purchase the material for the improvements to be erected on this land.

After this agreement had been made and communicated to said lumber company, and during the latter part of January, 1918, Smith procured a conveyance of the property to Jonassen, which* was filed for record February 5, 1918. Smith took back a first ¡mortgage for $10,000 to Farmers’ State Bank of Lane, filed for record February 5, 1918. He also took a second mortgage to him[344]*344self for $9,000, filed for record February 8, 1918, and a third mortgage also to himself, which was filed for record August 16, 1918.

During the first week in February, 19x8, Jonassen contracted with the lumber company for the material and began hauling it to these premises and began improvements' thereon. Smith never furnished and money. Nothing was paid to the lumber company. Within the time allowed by law, they filed a lien on the land and buildings for $3,629.45.

Smith wrongfully assigned the $3,000 mortgage to Wessington Springs State Bank. It began an action against Smith and Jonas and Bertha Jonassen to- foreclose. The lumber company intervened. Smith defaulted. The other parties named appeared. On the trial, decree was entered for defendant lumber company, :-nd against Jonas Jonassen for the amount of its lien in the sum of '$4,214.50, and costs, and declaring the mechanic’s lien a fieri on the land subject to the two mortgages for $19,000 and the homestead rights of the Jonassens in the sum. of $5,000, and further declaring the mechanic’s lien superior to the lien of both the first and second mortgages on said buildings, and directing the real property and improvements be sold to satisfy interveners’ claim. The court adjudged costs in that action against the plaintiff, and ordered the cancellation of its mortgage and the assignment thereof.

This decree was signed January 11, 1922, and is still in full force and not appealed from. It was also- found that the money due on the lumber company’s lien was for lumber and -materials for the construction of the frame house, barn, hog house, and poultry house on this land.

The $9,000 second mortgage was assigned by Smith to this plaintiff by an- instrument dated January 31, 1918, but the assignment was not recorded until the 21st day of October, 1921. Default was made in the conditions of this mortgage. It was foreclosed and bid in by plaintiff December 9, 1921. No redemption was made from such sale, and sheriff’s deed issued to plaintiff in December, 1922. This mortgage was in the form prescribed 'by statute, and the mortgagors therein waived all their homestead rights to the mortgagee. Plaintiff is now the owner and holder of this land.

[345]*345On -September 30, 1922, the Jonassens, by an. instrument in writing, waived all their homestead rights to the premises described in this complaint and in the decree of the lumber company, above referred to, and also waived such right in their answer and in their evidence "given at the trial of the instant case.

The buildings have a value separate from the land, and can be removed without injury to the freehold. The buildings are so constructed and attached to the premises they cannot be severed and removed from.the land without material injury to such buildings.

The first question we are to decide is, Do the foregoing findings of fact, considered- in the light of all the presumptions o-flaw arising from them, and all the inferences .and deductions naturally and logically flowing from them, fairly support the conclusions of law drawn by the trial court ? In other words, has the court correctly applied the law to the facts he has found?

Appellant’s six assignments of error sufficiently state these conclusions of law, and the errors appellant assigns to each of them, and are as follows:

I. Error in concluding that the mechanic’s lien of defendant lumber company upon the frame house, barn, hen house, and hog house was superior to any claim or right of plaintiff.

II. Error in concluding that the homestead rights of Jonas-sen and wife not being asserted against said buildings, the plaintiff herein has no claim against them.

III. Error in concluding that defendant lumber company has a lien upon- the buildings on the premises paramount and superior to any claim of the plaintiff, and a right to sell said buildings apart from the realty on which they are situated, and remove same from the premises.

IV. Error in awarding defendant lumber company a decree denying plaintiff the relief prayed for.

V. Error in not finding the value of the premises involved herein, although requested by plaintiff to make such finding.

VI. Error in entering judgment for the lumber company for all the reasons here-before set forth.

It is plaintiff’s, contention, under assignment No. 1: First, that the court has found defendant lumber company had [346]

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Related

Vining v. Kovarik
116 N.W.2d 638 (South Dakota Supreme Court, 1962)
Wilson v. Hayes-Lucas Lumber Co.
226 N.W. 343 (South Dakota Supreme Court, 1929)

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Bluebook (online)
207 N.W. 155, 49 S.D. 341, 1926 S.D. LEXIS 34, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wilson-v-hayes-lucas-lumber-co-sd-1926.