Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

202 Ky. 356

Butts v. Skinner

Court of Appeals of Kentucky

Decided March 7, 1924

Court of Appeals of Kentucky · decided 1924-03-07

Relies on Padgett v. Decker · Rice v. Blair · Creech v. Creech

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1924-03-07

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently December 1948

5 state decisions

20192419301940decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1Opinion op the Court by

Judge Clarke

¶2Affirming.

¶3In 1890, appellees’ father, Charles Anderson, put appellants in possession of a town lot owned by him, under a verbal contract of sale by which he agreed to convey same to them upon their payment to him of $450.00. They remained in possession of the lot until 1916, and the sole question at issue in this action is whether they acquired title by adverse possession..

¶4The rule is thoroughly established that “The possession of the vendee, under an executory contract of sale is not adverse to that of his vendor until he has performed the conditions thereof or repudiated the latter’s title, and this- is true whether the contract be in writing or in parol.” Creech, et al. v. Creech, et al., 186 Ky. 149, 216, S. W. 127; Padgett v. Decker, 145 Ky. 227, 140 S. W. 152; Rice, et al. v. Blair, 161 Ky. 280, 170 S. W. 657; Blair, et al. v. Meade, et ux., 192 Ky. 720, 234 S. W. 433; 2 C. J. 153; 1 R. C. L. 750.

¶5While appellants were in possession of the property for about twenty-six years, there is no competent evidence that they ever paid the whole of the agreed purchase price or any considerable part thereof, or did anything to bring home to the vendor knowledge that they repudiated or disputed his title to the lot. The fact that during their occupancy they paid the taxes on the property and kept it in repair does not indicate their possession was adverse, since they did this as well'before as *357after they claim to have paid for the property, as presumably their contract obligated them to do. Besides, the decided weight of the evidence is that appellants acknowledged an indebtedness to appellees on the lot almost up to the time this litigation began.

¶6Under such circumstances the chancellor could not have done otherwise than adjudge the possession of appellants amicable and the title in the heirs of the vendor, and the judgment is affirmed.

/202/ky/356 · .json · Public domain