Phenix Insurance v. Stocks

Citations

• 149 Ill. 319
• 36 N.E. 408

Syllabus

<p>1. Insurance—application—answers written by agent of the insurer with full knowledge of the facts. On an application of a husband for the insurance of his wife’s buildings, etc., the husband alone answered the interrogatories orally to the agent of the company, who reduced his answers to writing. To the question, “What is the title; answer particularly,” the husband answered, “My wife has a warranty deed from her father to the land,” the truth being, that the deed from the father was a warranty deed to his daughter “and the heirs of her body.” The agent inserted “fee simple” as the title. When the answer to the question, as entered, was read over by the agent, the applicant said he guessed it was right: Held, that as the entries in the application were made by the insurance company’s general agent, and the insured was guilty of no fraud, the falsity of such -representations could not be shown by the company to release it from liability for a loss.</p> <p>2. Where the agent of an insurance company, in taking an application for insurance, is informed of the circumstances of plaintiff’s title, so that the company could, upon inquiry, have learned its nature, and without specifying the true answer of the plaintiff in the application concluded plaintiff had a title in fee, and so inserted such statement without the plaintiff’s knowledge, the company can not avoid liability on the ground the title is not truly stated in the written application.</p> <p>3. Same—erroneous conclusion of agent. Where the assured fully discloses to the insurance company, or its agent, the necessary facts, or they are otherwise cognizant of them, and they dispense with any act on his part, they will be estopped from denying the description in the policy. If, from the facts, they erroneously determine that the insured has one kind of interest in the premises when he has another, the company will be estopped from saying that it was mistaken, and by that means to escape the liability it has incu