Butler Savings Bank v. Osborne

Citations

• 159 Pa. 10
• 28 A. 163
• 1893 Pa. LEXIS 1470

Syllabus

<p>Tenants in common — Partnership—Presumption.</p> <p>Tenants in common engaged in the improvement or development of the common property will be presumed, in the absence of proof of a contract of partnership, to hold the same relation to each other during such improvement or development as before it began. As to third persons, they may subject themselves to liability as partners by a course of dealing or • by their acts and declarations, but as to each other their relation depends on their title until by their agreement with each other they change it.</p> <p>Tenants in common — Oil lease — Partnership.</p> <p>When tenants in common of an oil lease agree to carry on operations upon their land, each contributing towards the expenses in proportion to his respective interest in the land, they will be considered with respect both to themselves and third persons as the ordinary owners of land, working their respective shares of the wells, responsible only for their own acts, subject to no laws of partnership whatever, and possessing distinct rights in the property.</p> <p>Two tenants in common of an oil lease entered into an agreement with each other to drill wells on the leasehold property, each to pay one half of the costs of sinking the well and pumping the oil. The oil produced was to be run into pipe lines serving the district, and there credited one half to each of the tenants in common. Held, that no partnership existed between the tenants in common.</p>