Opinion
No. 5018.
May 2, 1929.
APPEAL from the District Court of the Eleventh Judicial District, for Minidoka County. Hon. T. Bailey Lee, Judge.
Action to foreclose mortgage on real estate. Judgment for plaintiff. Affirmed.
S.T. Lowe, for Appellants.
The doctrine of estoppel does not apply and cannot defeat the estate of the minors in and to the property described in said mortgage. ( Ewald v. Hufton, 31 Idaho 373, 173 P. 247; Missouri Central Bldg. Loan Assn. v. Eveler, 237 Mo. 679, Ann. Cas. 1913A, 486, 141 S.W. 877; Bjmerland v. Eley, 15 Wn. 101, 45 Pac. 730; Adams v. Black, 6 Wn. 528, 33 P. 1074.)
Edwin Snow and Karl Paine, for Respondent Moore, Trustee.
The presumption is that all property acquired by either spouse during the marriage is community property; hence the deed to the mortgagor created the presumption that the premises were community property. ( Bannock Nat. Bank v. Automobile Accessories Co., 37 Idaho 787, 219 P. 200; Clifford v. Lake, 33 Idaho 77, 190 P. 714.)
It is a well-established principle that where the true owner of property, for however short a time, allows another to appear as the owner or having full control of, or disposition over, the property, and innocent third parties are thus led into dealing with the apparent owner, they will be protected; and such rights do not depend upon the actual title or right or authority of the party with whom they have directly dealt, but are derived from the conduct of the real owner, which precludes him from disputing against them the existence of the title or right or power which he caused or allowed to appear to be vested in the party using such property to obtain credit. ( Chaney v. The Gauld Co., 28 Idaho 76, 152 P. 468; Grice v. Woodworth, 10 Idaho 459, 109 Am. St. 214, 80 P. 912, 69 L.R.A. 584.)
This has become the settled law of Idaho. ( McKeehan v. Vollmer-Clearwater Co., 30 Idaho 505, Ann. Cas. 1918E, 1197, 166 Pac. 256; Kansas City Life Ins. Co. v. Harroun, 44 Idaho 643, 258 P. 929.)
"The rule of equitable estoppel is as applicable to a married woman who has placed the title to her real estate in her husband, who has thereby obtained a credit, as though she had put the title in the name of a third party. ( Galbraith v. Lunsford, 87 Tenn. 89, 9 S.W. 365, 1 L.R.A. 522; 2 Pomeroy on Equity Jurisprudence, 3d ed., sec. 814.) The authorities so holding are numerous." ( Goldberg v. Parker, 87 Conn. 99, Ann. Cas. 1914C, 1059, 87 Atl. 555, 46 L.R.A., N.S., 1097.)
This case involves the foreclosure of a note and mortgage executed by William P. Croft and wife, Ida J. Croft, for $2,000, upon lands standing of record in the name of the defendant William P. Croft. This note and mortgage were executed in blank at the same time and in the same manner, and induced by the same representations, as were the note and mortgage involved in Moore v. Croft (No. 5019), post, p. 572, 277 P. 423, and as to the main issues the decision in that case is controlling here.
In this case, however, appears the additional fact that the land mortgaged had been in part the separate property of Mary I Croft, deceased, a former wife of the defendant William P. Croft, who died intestate March 19, 1919, leaving minor children. William P. Croft, as administrator of her estate, intervened in this action, and as such administrator appeals from the decree of foreclosure which was rendered.
Property acquired by either spouse after marriage is presumably community property. ( Bannock Nat. Bank v. Automobile Accessories Co., 37 Idaho 787, 219 P. 200; Clifford v. Lake, 33 Idaho 77, 190 P. 714.) The law as it existed at the time of the death of Mary I. Croft in 1919 (C. S., sec. 7803), provided that upon the death of either spouse intestate the share of such deceased spouse in the community property should go to the survivor, and that no administration of the estate of the wife should be necessary if she died intestate. It is not contended here that she left a will. The trial court found that though the property, which was acquired after her marriage, was in part the separate property of Mary I. Croft, the title to it was, with her knowledge, taken in the name of her husband, William P. Croft, and that during her lifetime she knowingly permitted the title to remain in him. By so doing, she represented to the world that the property was community property, and that, upon her death intestate, he would be the owner of the whole, with full power to convey or mortgage it. This representation on her part made it possible for him, after her death, to represent himself to be the sole owner of the property, as lie did by mortgaging it to plaintiff. The case is squarely within the rule of Chaney v. The Gauld Co., 28 Idaho 76, 152 P. 468.
This case is distinguished from the decision in Ewald v. Hufton, 31 Idaho 373, 173 P. 247, relied upon by appellant, in that, under the law as it existed when the facts of that case arose, the share of a deceased intestate spouse in the community property descended to the heirs rather than to the survivor.
In cases in which a decedent would be estopped, the personal representatives ordinarily will be estopped in the same manner and to the same extent. (21 C. J. 1182.) William P. Croft, as administrator, is estopped to claim the property as that of his decedent to the same extent that she would be estopped were she living.
The judgment is affirmed, with costs to respondent.
Budge, C.J., and Givens and Wm. E. Lee, JJ., concur.