149 Iowa 336 | Iowa | 1910
The plaintiff is the wife of C. J. Copper, who held the legal title to a farm of one hundred and forty acres situated in Polk County. In 1907 the Iowa Trust & Savings Bank obtained a judgment against Copper for $68 on a promissory note. In January, 1908, execution issued under such judgment, and was levied upon the farm in question. On February 17, 1908, the farm was sold at execution sale en masse to the execution plaintiff for $102.60, being the amount of the judgment and costs. The farm in question was incumbered by a mortgage for $3,500, with some accrued' interest, and past-due taxes, and its fair market value was somewhere between $8,500 and $12,600. No redemption having been made from the execution sale, a sheriff’s deed was issued at the expiration of the year to the defendant Elizabeth Hauge as assignee of the execution plaintiff. The defendant Elizabeth Hauge is the wife of A. O. Hauge, the cashier of the Iowa Trust & Savings Bank, and the person who bid in the property for the execution plaintiff. The plaintiff claims to be the equitable owner of the farm in question, and claims that her husband held only the legal title in resulting trust for her. She alleged in her petition that she knew nothing of the sheriff’s sale until shortly after the issuance of the sheriff’s deed, and that she knew
Knowledge of the sheriff’s deed came to the plaintiff, within a few days after its issue, not through her husband, but through one Venneman and one Mathis. She immediately called upon the defendant’s husband, A. O. Ilauge, and asserted her right to the land, and offered to hold -the purchaser harmless by restoring to her the full amount of the purchase with -interest, costs, and $100 permium. It is manifest, therefore, that there was no occasion for any collusion between herself and her husband at any time prior to the expiration of day of redemption. On the whole record, we are quite ready to agree with the trial court that, as between the plaintiff and her husband, he held the legal title in trust for her as the equitable owner. And this fact will be assumed in the further discussion of the case.
Of the effect this finding might have had upon the right of the execution plaintiff to levy upon this land at all is a question which we will have no occasion to
The plaintiff and her husband moved upon the farm with their family about the year 1894, and occupied the same as their homestead until the year 1899, at which time they moved to Des Moines, where they have lived ever since without acquiring any other homestead. The children have attended school there. The wife has suffered much from ill health. The husband has become engaged in the saloon business, and it seems to be conceded by both sides that he has formed a habit of unduly patronizing his own bar. Both husband and wife contend that they left,the homestead temporarily only, intending to return thereto, and that they have never abandoned such intention. The farm was rented from year to year, and there, is much in their conduct that is consistent with
Disregarding the homestead question for the moment, it is the contention of the plaintiff that the sheriff’s sale was voidable, if not void, (1) because the levy was excessive and in violation of section 3970 of the Code; (2) because the sale was en masse and in violation of the same section; (3) because the consideration was grossly inadequate and unconscionable; (4) because there was no pub
As against this, we have held that gross inadequacy of consideration is nevertheless a very important fact in connection with other circumstances as tending to establish fraud either actual or constructive. Where other circum