34 N.J. Eq. 417 | New York Court of Chancery | 1881
The petitioner asks that the sheriff’s sale of mortgaged premises, under the execution in this cause (a suit for foreclosure), may be set aside on two grounds—surprise and inadequacy of price. The property is in Newark. It was struck off at the sale to the solicitor of the Newark City National Bank and Edward Longman, judgment creditors, at $6,0.00. After the sale, the purchaser agreed with the Wildes, subsequent judgment creditors, to sell the property to them for the $6,000 and the amount due to his clients on their judgments, and he directed the sheriff to make a deed to them accordingly. The money, however, has not yet been paid, nor the deed delivered. The amount due the complainant was about $5,900. The petitioner claims to own half of the property, subject to the mortgage, by title superior to the judgments, and, failing that (her deed therefor having been by a decree of this court declared void as against the judgments of the bank, Longman and the Wildes, from which decree she has appealed), she claims her dower in the surplus remaining after paying the amount due the complainant. She directed her solicitors to attend the sale, and directed them to bid the property up for her to $7,300, and they agreed to do so. They charged one of their assistants, also a lawyer, with the duty. He attended on two occasions, but the sale was then adjourned. On the day to which it was last adjourned he forgot the matter, and did not attend, and the property was then sold in his absence; consequently nobody was present on her behalf. She lived in New York city, and. relied wholly on her solicitors to attend to the sale for her. The sale was, beyond all question, a surprise upon her. There is no proof as to what the property would probably bring on a resale. A very competent judge of the value testifies that its market value is at least $10,000. but he does not state what, in
