Abbott v. Crawford & Conover

Citations

• 59 Wash. 402
• 109 P. 1063
• 1910 Wash. LEXIS 1212

Syllabus

<p>Brokers — Liability-—Recovery of Earnest Money — Fact of Employment — Evidence—Sufficiency. In an action to recover earnest money paid on an intended purchase of land, the preponderance of the evidence shows that plaintiff dealt with the defendant as an agent or broker, and not as .the principal, and defendant is not liable for the earnest money where it appears that the defendant, a corporation engaged in the real estate business, a day or two after application by the plaintiff for tide lands, submitted a proposition on property belonging to one C., whom two witnesses testified was. present at plaintiff’s office with defendant’s employee, that plaintiff, who was a lawyer, drew his check for $700 payable to the defendant, and insisted upon two receipts, which he drew up, one being from C. to the defendant for $500 earnest money, $200 being the amount of defendant’s commissions retained by it, and that four days later, at defendant’s office, plaintiff met C., as he claims for the first time, and objected to the contract of sale because C. was a married man and the contract was not signed by C.’s wife, and not because the contract was not signed by the defendant; since the recitation in the receipt that C. had received the $500 from the defendant must be construed in the light of the whole transaction, and the other circumstances-bear the scale in favor of the respondent (Gose, J., dissenting).</p>