Leggate v. Korn

Citations

• 74 Pa. Super. 383
• 1920 Pa. Super. LEXIS 158

Syllabus

<p>Subrogation — Mortgages—Right to assignment of mortgages— Payment of debt by third party.</p> <p>The doctrine of subrogation is not applied for the mere stranger or volunteer who has paid the debt of another without any assignment or agreement for subrogation, being under no legal obligation to make the payment, and not being compelled to do so for the preservation of any rights or property of his own.</p> <p>Where a mortgage is given to secure a loan, accompanied by notes as collateral security, the payment of such notes by a third party will not entitle him to the assignment of the mortgage, nor will he be subrogated to the rights of the original creditor. Not being under any legal or moral compulsion to pay the notes and not having an existing interest, fixed or contingent, to safeguard, he had no equity to entitle him to subrogation in the absence of an agreement between him and the mortgagor.</p> <p>Any instruction which would permit the jury to find for the plaintiff, on the equitable ground, that having paid the notes the third party became entitled to the security of the mortgage, irrespective of any agreement between himself and the mortgagor, constituted reversible error.</p>