Kanawell v. Miller

Citations

• 262 Pa. 9
• 104 A. 861
• 1918 Pa. LEXIS 576

Syllabus

<p>Real estate — Deeds—Delivery—Presumed from circumstance — ■ Absence of manual delivery■ — •Placing deed in grantor’s safe — Grantor’s declarations — Burden of proof — Case for jury.</p> <p>1. Delivery of a deed may be inferred from circumstances and it is not necessary to prove actual manual investiture. Delivery may be made by words alone, or acts alone, or by both together, but there must be sufficient to show an intention to pass title.</p> <p>2. In an action of ejectment where the controlling question was whether there had been a delivery of a deed of the premises to defendant during the lifetime of a decedent under whom plaintiff claimed as heir, the case was for the jury and a verdict and judgment for defendant will be sustained where it appeared that defendant, a nephew of decedent’s wife, lived with decedent and was treated by him as a son; that four years after the purchase of the property by decedent he executed and acknowledged a deed to defendant, who was then six years old, in consideration of “one dollar and natural love and affection”; that subsequently the deed was enclosed in an envelope endorsed in grantor’s handwriting with defendant’s name; that, from childhood on, defendant had access to the safe and frequently opened it; that deceased told a relative that in case anything happened such relative and defendant should open the safe and that defendant’s deed and decedent’s will were therein; and that decedent on numerous occasions during his life, sometimes in the presence of defendant and on other occasions in his absence, stated that the farm was defendant’s and that decedent did not own it but was only overseer for defendant; and, although decedent disposed of other real estate by will, neither in his will nor in the codicils thereto did he mention the farm in question.</p> <p>3. Proof of the deed to the defendant, duly acknowledged and recorded, placed the title and right of possession prima facie in the defendant, but the burden of proof sh