97 Iowa 677 | Iowa | 1896
I. Daniel McDonald was the owner of three lots in Sioux City.' On the seventeenth day of July, 1888, he sold the lots to John Magirl, the defendant herein. The purchase price was two thousand, five hundred dollars. Of this sum, eight hundred dollars was paid in cash. There was a mortgage on the property for eight hundred dollars, and interest, which McDonald had before that time executed to one, Charles Q^Orr. A deed was made from McDonald to the defendant, for the lots, by which McDonald
The contention of appellee is that, when Orr forelosed the second mortgage, and bought the land, he bought it subject to the senior mortgage, and the senior mortgage thereby merged into the fee, and the debt was extinguished. In our opinion, this proposition is correct, and in accord with the law applicable to merger in such cases. The principle is recognized in the cases of Crowley v. Harader, 69 Iowa, 83 (28 N. W. Rep. 446), and Byington. v. Fountain, 61 Iowa, 512 (14 N. W. Rep. 220 and 16 N. W. Rep. 534). In the case of Bank v. Reis (Ill. Sup.) (26 N. E. Rep. 646), the following language is employed: “When one who is absolutely entitled in his own right to a charge or incumbrance on land, becomes the owner in fee of the same land, with no intervening interest or lien, the charge will at law, merge in the ownership, and
Our conclusion is that the acquisition of the title under the foreclosure of the second mortgage, extinguished the debt secured by the first mortgage.— Affirmed.