121 Md. 320 | Md. | 1913
delivered the opinion, of the Court.
The Wylie Heights Company was formed in the year 1907 for the purpose of developing a tract of about 125 acres on the northern edge of the City of Baltimore, lying partly in Baltimore City and partly in Baltimore County. The tract extended from the Pimlico road on the west to Green Spring avenue on the east, and with a portion of it lying to the east of Green Spring avenue. It was conveyed to the company by Gerald Hill, and was at the time of the conveyance subject to a mortgage of $100,000 which had five years to run from the 29th July, 1907. On July 29, 1907, the day when Mr. Hill conveyed the property to the Wylie Heights Company, that corporation executed a mortgage on the property for the sum of $25,000 to William B. Einney, which amount is recited in the mortgage to have been that day loaned and advanced to the Wylie Heights Company. While it does not in terms appear from the record, the inference is very strong that the purpose of this loan was to prosecute the development work on the property. The corporation having thus come into possession of the property, it had the same, or at least that portion of it lying between the Pimlico road and Green Spring avenue, platted in lots, streets laid out and to some extent graded and macadamized, some drains and sewerage pipes laid, and concrete walks put down to a considerable extent. By the Spring of 1912, out of 328 lots platted, 79 had been sold and 219 remained unsold. Defaults had been made in both mortgages and in April of 1912 Dr. Einney instituted proceedings to foreclose his mortgage.
Under the terms of the mortgage from Gerald Hill to Henry E. Carstens, Trustee, for $100,000, it was provided that the mortgagor and his assigns should have the right to sell the property in lots, and that the mortgagee would release lots having “an area of one acre and be in the form of a square, i. e., bounded by four sides of equal length at right angles to each other; any number of such lots may be included in a single release.” Eor the release of each such lot fronting on the east side of the Pimlico Road, the mortgage^
The property was sold under the foreclosure proceedings instituted by Dr. Finney on the 7th of May, 1912, subject to the outstanding mortgage to Carstens, upon which there was then due $66,807.03, and was bought in by the mortgagee Finney, for his own protection, for the sum of $36,000. It further appears from the testimony that the Wylie Heights Company in April, 1910, sold out to another corporation known as the Edgecombe Park Company. Hpon the report of the sale, exceptions to its ratification were filed by both the Wylie Heights Company and the Edgecombe Park Company, and it is from the order of the Circuit Court for Baltimore County overruling these exceptions and ratifying the sale that each of these corporations have appealed.
The exceptions to the sale are twelve in number, but it is unnecessary to consider each one in detail, since they all may be grouped under three heads — first, the advertisement of the sale; second, the manner of the sale; and third, the adequacy or inadequacy of the price for which the property was sold.
With regard to the advertisement the objection made is twofold in character, insufficiency of the media through which the property was advertised, and insufficiency of .description of the property. The evidence is that advertisement in full
When the property was surveyed and laid off, it was divided into blocks and lots; the advertisement of the sale stated that the property would be offered by blocks, and subsequently as a whole, the mortgagee reserving the .right to close the sale as a sale of blocks or an entirety, according as the property would produce most. The ground of the exceptions under this head, is that the property should have been offered by lots, instead of by blocks, for the purpose of attracting individual buyers for single lots, and the evidence is more or less conflicting upon this point. The situation was one which undoubtedly called for the exercise of judg
The rule has been long and well settled in this State “that mere inadequacy of price, of itself, is not sufficient to set aside a sale unless it is so gross as to indicate misconduct or fraud on the part of the trustee or mortgagee making it, or there is some just cause which the purchaser may be responsible for which affords reasonable ground for supposing that the sale was improperly made.” Conroy v. Carroll, 82 Md. 127; Shaw v. Smith, 107 Md. 523.
Upon the question of price the evidence in this case is very conflicting, and differs, therefore, radically from the case of
Without reviewing in detail the opinions and reasons given by the different witnesses for their widely varying estimates, it will be sufficient to say, that the evidence offered upon both sides has been carefully examined and compared, and that as the result of such examination this Court cannot say that the witnesses of the appellee are entirely wrong, or that the price for which the property was sold was so grossly below its full value as to make it proper for this Court to set aside the sale.
The order of the Circuit Court for Baltimore County in overruling the exceptions and ratifying the sale will, therefore, be affirmed.
Order affirmed, with costs in each case to the appellee.