Bauck v. Swan

Citations

• 146 Pa. 444
• 23 A. 242
• 1892 Pa. LEXIS 1246

Syllabus

<p>1. Under § 1, act of June 3, 1887, P. L. 332, a married woman has the right to sell her land, with the same effect as if she were a feme-sole, except with the restriction that her title cannot be conveyed without the joinder of her husband in the deed. And her right to sell includes the right to employ an agent to sell for her, and to make a contract fixing his compensation.</p> <p>2. The ease of Real Estate Inv. Co. v. Roop, 132 Pa. 496, decides that general contracting power was not given to married women by the act of 1887, and therefore a married woman cannot confess a judgment for borrowed money; but that ease has no application to the question of her power to bind herself and her estate by employing an agent to sell her land for her.</p> <p>3. When the husband of a married woman employed a real-estate broker to effect a sale of her land, at a fixed compensation, and the broker procured a purchaser to whom the land was afterwards conveyed, the plaintiff- was properly allowed to recover the compensation fixed by his agreement with the husband, the jury having fotmd that the wife had ratified it with full knowledge of its-terms.</p>