59 Mo. App. 682 | Mo. Ct. App. | 1894
Plaintiff is a real estate agent. He instituted this action before a justice of the peace to recover from the defendant $200, which he alleged the defendant agreed to pay him as commission on a real estate transaction. The defendant is the owner of some property on Cleveland avenue, and Charles H. Sawyer and others were the owners of a business house on Franklin avenue. The plaintiff claims that the defendant employed him to effect an exchange of the properties on certain terms; that he' induced Sawyer to agree to the exchange on the terms proposed; that Sawyer offered to consummate the trade, and that the defendant declined. The defendant admitted that there were some negotiations between him, Sawyer and the plaintiff, looking to an exchange of the properties, but he claimed that the plaintiff- acted therein as the agent of Sawyer and not as his agent. He denied that he had agreed to pay plaintiff $200, or any other sum, as commissions. Under the instructions of the court the jury returned -a verdict for the plaintiff for the full amount, for which judgment was rendered. Defendant has appealed, and he asks for a reversal of the judgment, on the grounds that the verdict and judgment are unsupported by the evidence, and are against the instructions.
At the instance of the plaintiff, the court give the following instruction:
“The court instructs the jurors, if they believe and find from the evidence that plaintiff is a real estate agent, and that defendant agreed to pay plaintiff the sum of $200 for his service in procuring the exchange of eight hundred feet of ground for defendant, situated in Tyler Place, in the City of St. Louis, for the property mentioned in evilence on Franklin avenue, on the following terms—defendant to take a convey
As a qualification of the foregoing instruction, the court gave the following at the instance of the defendant:
“If the jury believe from the evidence that the plaintiff had an arrangement whereby he was to receive commissions from the other party to the exchange of property in question, as well as from the defendant, and that he did not disclose this fact to defendant, then they,will find in favor of the defendant.”
There was evidence tending to prove the facts stated in the first instruction; therefore the plaintiff is entitled to an affirmance of the judgment, unless the facts stated in the second instruction are established by all the evidence in the cause..
The plaintiff’s evidence established the following state of facts. The defendant owned some lots on Cleveland avenue, which he ■ valued at $20,000. A
The law is well settled that a real estate agent can not legally charge or receive commissions from both, parties to a sale or trade, unless they consent to it. Chapman v. Currie, 51 Mo. App. 40. The “pooling arrangement” testified to by plaintiff is not, strictly speáking, a double agency, but it is tantamount to it. and has all of its ugly features. Under it the plaintiff and Sawyer were attempting to do indirectly what the-law would not permit them to do directly; that is, charge commissions on both sides. Under it the.
We see no necessity of remanding the cause, as t*he right of recovery is defeated by the unqualified admissions of the plaintiff himself. The judgment will be reversed and the cause dismissed.