165 Iowa 703 | Iowa | 1914
The plaintiff alleges that the defendants, who are real estate dealers, proposed to him to enter into a partnership or joint adventure with them for the purchase of a section of land in Nebraska for their mutual benefit and profit; the plaintiff to have a half interest in the investment, and the defendants together to have the other half. He further alleges that, among the inducements offered for entering upon said venture, defendants represented that the land could be purchased for $20 per acre, which was the lowest price for which it could be obtained, and that to secure the same each purchaser would be required to pay $500 as an advance installment; the remainder to be paid when the conveyance was delivered. It is further alleged that plaintiff had no knowledge of the facts so represented except as stated by the defendants, and, believing and relying thereon, he entered into an agreement with the defendants by which he was to contribute to the said purchase one-half of the alleged purchase price of the land at $20 per acre; the title to be first taken in the name of the defendants, who undertook and agreed to thereafter convey an undivided one-half to him. Still relying upon and believing said representations, plaintiff says he did thereupon pay the advance payment of $500 and later sufficient to make the entire contribution of $6,400, being one-half the alleged purchase price of the land, and defendants did then or soon thereafter convey to him a one-half interest therein. He further alleges that the statements and representations made to him by defendants as to the purchase price of the land were false and fraudulent and were
I. The first point made by the appellants is that the verdict is without support in the evidence.
The question thus raised is one of fact, the decision of which depends upon the credibility of the witnesses and the weight and value of their testimony. It is an elementary proposition that an issue of this character is for the jury alone and that a verdict so rendered is conclusive upon the court unless it must be set aside for prejudicial error otherwise appearing.
Counsel appear to contend that, because the title was concededly first taken in the names of the defendants who thereafter conveyed a half interest to the plaintiff pursuant to an ordinary contract of sale theretofore made between them, the court should hold as a matter of law that plaintiff’s claim of a partnership or joint venture cannot be sustained. The position is not tenable. It is not inconsistent with plaintiff’s claim of a joint enterprise that the title should have been taken in the manner stated. At the time plaintiff says the agreement was made, defendants had already been in communication with the owner of the land, one Lukefahr, a resident of Texas, had ascertained its price, and had forwarded a contract to be executed by the owner to sell and convey the land to them. In that situation it was entirely natural, even if the alleged joint agreement was made as plaintiff says it was, that said contract of purchase by the defendants from Lukefahr should be consummated by a conveyance direct to themselves and that they should complete
There is much in the record tending to corroborate and strengthen plaintiff’s theory of the facts; but we have already pointed out sufficient to demonstrate that a jury question was presented, and it is unnecessary to extend this opinion for further recital of the record.
II. Complaint is made that the court failed to instruct the jury upon the law with respect to deceit and false representations.
IV. Finally, it is said that the court erred in failing to specifically direct the jury as to the effect of the written contract by which defendants agreed to convey to plaintiff a half interest in the land, which contract, as we have before said, was in form an ordinary agreement for the sale and conveyance of real estate.
The court did call the attention of the jury to the fact that this contract had been pleaded in the answer and was in evidence. It also instructed that the question whether there was a joint or partnership agreement for the ownership of the land bought from Lukefahr was a matter to be deterinined by the jury from all the evidence, which, of course, included evidence of the contract and its contents. If, as we have said, and here repeat, the arrangement by which plaintiff took title to his interest in the land is not necessarily conclusive against the theory of a partnership or joint undertaking, there is nothing in the instructions which constitutes prejudicial error. It was open to the defendants, had they so desired, to request additional or more specific instructions. This was not done, and under familiar rules error cannot be successfully assigned thereon. It was not left to the jury, as counsel argue, to construe that contract, but rather to determine, from all the facts in evidence including the contract, the truth of plaintiff’s claim that the conveyance to him was simply the method or means adopted by the parties to effectuate or carry out an agreement of partnership in the purchase and ownership of the land.
No valid reason appears for disturbing the judgment of the district court, and it is therefore — Affirmed.