McLean v. Spratt

Citations

• 19 Fla. 97

Syllabus

<p>i. Upon a sale of real estate at auction the agent of the vendor announces that the purchaser upon the payment of $500 cash shall be entitled to possession and future rents from a date stated. The purchaser pays the $500, the agent gives him a list of the tenants, and the purchaser treats with one of the tenants upon the basis of the relation of tenant from month to month to him as landlord, such agent acquiescing by his silence and presence in the existence of such relation. Held: That .the creation of such relation of tenant from month to month in the manner stated is legal, not in conflict with the statute of frauds, and that in order to constitute an unlawful detention ol possession of such property rrnder the statute regulating the subject, the landlord must show a notice to quit conformable to the terms or to the law of the contract of tenancy or a holding over after legal de. mand of the payment of rent due.</p> <p>3. A simple demand of possession is not a notice to quit, nor do the facts that the tenant failed to pay the rent but admitted his responsibility for it and promised to pay it, constitute such a legal demand as is necessary to establish an unlawful detaiuer under the statute.</p>