Federal Sales Co. v. Kiefer

Citations

• 273 Pa. 42
• 116 A. 545
• 1922 Pa. LEXIS 511

Syllabus

<p>Bailment — Contract—Executory—Sale—Final agreement — Replevin — Evidence—Proposals of sale — Damages—Demand—Notice —Harmless error.</p> <p>1. The fact that the original intention of the parties to a contract, was to make a sale, and that such is the legal effect of their first agreement, does not prevent a change while it is still executory, into a bailment with an alternative of future conversion into a sale on the compliance with the stipulated conditions.</p> <p>2. Where the parties enter into a contract of bailment after there had been original sale proposals between them, and replevin is brought for the property covered by the bailment, that the original sale proposals were not admitted in evidence in such action, would at best be only a harmless error, as the legal effect of the transaction would not be altered.</p> <p>3. It is unnecessary for a bailment lease to stipulate for a return of the property. Replevin may be brought for the property although no such stipulation is in the contract.</p> <p>4. The fact that a bailor has indulged the bailee as to installment payments long overdue, does not deprive him of his right to reclaim the property in accordance with the terms of the contract.</p> <p>5. Where a bailment authorized the bailor upon demand to forthwith take possession of the property, and the bailor, twenty-eight days before he issues a writ of replevin, notifies the bailee in writing he would be obliged to retake the property unless past due installments are paid, the bailee cannot set up a lack of demand as a defense.</p> <p>6. In such case the notice whether oral or written need be in no set form of words.</p> <p>7. Where plaintiff in the replevin rightly repossessed himself of the property covered by the bailment, the question as to who would ultimately have been the owner, if no default had been made, is irrelevant, and parol testimony on the subject is inadmissible.</p> <p>8. Evidence of the damages sustained by defendant by loss of the prope