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78 Misc. 55

Roedmann v. Hertel

Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York

Decided October 15, 1912

Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York · decided 1912-10-15

<p>Municipal Courts — equitable jurisdiction — summary proceedings. Landlord and tenant — lease — summary proceedings.</p> <p>Municipal Courts have no equitable jurisdiction, except in the matter of equitable defenses, to dispossess proceedings.</p> <p>Where the day after an unsigned lease was given to defendant, he paid a deposit and received a receipt reciting a five-year lease, and entered into possession and made permanent improvements, the grantee of the premises under a deed reciting said lease takes the title subject to all equities, and cannot maintain summary proceedings to dispossess the defendant upon a claim that there could be no such lease as it was not in writing signed by the party to be bound thereby.</p>

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1912-10-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 3 later decisions — most recently August 1971

3 state decisions

101912192019301940195019601970decided

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.

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Crane, J.

¶1This is a summary proceeding which was dismissed in the Municipal Court and the landlord appeals.

¶2The defendant claims to have a lease for five years, or until 1915. A formal lease was prepared by the former owners and given to him unsigned. The next day he paid a deposit and received a receipt reciting a five years’ lease. The plaintiff purchased the property and received a deed reciting a five years’ lease to the defendant, but now claims there can be no such lease as it is not in writing signed by the party to be bound thereby. The plaintiff took title subject to all equities as the tenant was in possession and the deed recited the supposed lease.

¶3That a court of equity would afford the defendant relief *56and compel specific performance by requiring the plaintiff or his grantors to execute a lease is quite certain. The defendant entered into possession and spent considerable money in permanent improvements.

¶4While sections 242 and 259 of the Real Property Law require leases and contracts for leases to be in writing, section 270 preserves to equity the power to require specific performance of agreements in case of part performance.,

¶5Muucipal Courts have no equitable jurisdiction except in this one instance — equitable "defenses — to dispossess proceedings. Section 2 of the Municipal Court Act permits a defendant to set up an equitable defense to summary proceedings. Rodgers v. Earle, 5 Misc. Rep. 164.

¶6The judgment of dismissal is affirmed.

¶7Aspinall and Putnam, JJ., concur.

¶8Judgment affirmed.

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