Yost v. Anchor Fire Insurance

Citations

• 38 Pa. Super. 594
• 1909 Pa. Super. LEXIS 193

Syllabus

<p>Insurance — Fire insurance — Policy—Construction of policy — Unoccupied building.</p> <p>1. All instruments and agreements are to be construed so as to give effect to the whole, or as large a portion as possible, of the instrument or agreement, and when a court of law is construing an instrument, it is legitimate, if two constructions are fairly possible, to adopt the one which equity would favor. When words admit of two senses, that which gives effect to the design of the parties is preferred to that which destroys it. Words, if of common use, are to be taken at their natural, plain, obvious and ordinary signification, but if technical words are used, they are to be used in a technical sense, unless a contrary intention clearly appears in either case from the context.</p> <p>2. An insurance company is chargeable with knowledge of the usual and customary methods of conducting the business which it insures.</p> <p>3. As commonly used and understood, the word “occupation” is synonymous with “possession,” but as used in a fire policy, providing that it shall become void if the house insured becomes unoccupied, means that no one lives therein. It is not synonymous with vacant, but is that condition where no one has the actual use or possession of the thing or property in question. In such constructions, the word is to be construed with reference to the nature and character of the building, the purpose for which it is designed, and the uses contemplated by the parties as expressed in the contract.</p> <p>4. A policy of insurance must be liberally construed in favor of the insured, so as not to defeat, without a plain necessity, his claim to indemnity, which, in making the insurance, it was his object to insure.</p> <p>5. Conditions providing for forfeitures are to receive, when the intent is doubtful, a strict construction against those for whose benefit they are introduced, and they are enforced only when there is the clearest evidence that that was what was meant by