Clark v. Price

Citations

• 19 Pa. Super. 582
• 1902 Pa. Super. LEXIS 156

Syllabus

<p>Contract — Agreement to purchase real estate — Instalments—Affidavit of defense.</p> <p>Where an agreement for the sale of land provides for the payment of the purchase money in instalments, and stipulates that the first twelve months’ instalments shall be retained by the vendor as liquidated damages in case of default by the vendee, and the vendee pays nine instalments, and thereafter enters into a new contract with the vendor for the purchase of additional land, and in the new contract it is agreed that the cash payment shall be an amount, which was the equivalent of the nine instalments paid under the first agreement, and described in the second agreement as “ allowance for cash paid on old book this day canceled,” and it is further stipulated in the second agreement that the first six months’ instalments shall be retained by the vendor as liquidated damages for the breach of the contract, the vendee cannot claim after a breach of the contract that the cash equivalent of the nine instalments paid under the first contract was not an instalment within the meaning of the words, “ the first six months’ instalments,” in the second contract, and especially so where the vendor, in a suit against him, avers, in an affidavit of defense, that the vendee had frequently admitted that he had no claim to the said sum, and that the vendor thereupon elected to retain said sum as liquidated damages.</p>