Rutherford v. Sargent

Citations

• 71 Ill. 339

Syllabus

<p>1. Specific performance—can not he claimed as a matter of right. A specific performance can not be claimed as a matter of right, but rests in the sound discretion of the court, and must be sustained bjr satisfactory-proof.</p> <p>2. Same—of parol contract to sell real estate, made by agent of the owner. A parol contract to sell real estate, made by an authorized agent, where acts are done by the purchaser sufficient to take it out of the operation of the Statute of Frauds and Perjuries, will, generally, be enforced in a court of equity.</p> <p>3. The owner of real estate authorized his son, as he claimed, to sell it at a certain price, and the son sold it at that price, by a parol contract, and received a part of the purchase money down, and gave credit for the deferred payments, all of which were subsequently made to him. The purchaser took possession and broke and fenced the land. The owner executed a deed to the purchaser, but never delivered it. He and the purchaser had frequent conversations relating to the land, and the purchase thereof, in which he neither denied nor repudiated the sale, or the authority of his son to make it, but claimed that his son had cheated him, and said that he would do what was right, but that he did not want to do anything until his son did something: Held, that a specific performance ought to be decreed, and that the owner should convey the land to the purchaser.</p>