delivered the opinion of the Court.
In an action in the Circuit Court for Baltimore County by the owners of an unimproved lot against a construction company for a complete breach of a written • contract to build a house, the court, sitting without a jury, found for the defendant and the plaintiffs appealed.
Calvin T. Ray and Katherine S. J. Ray, his wife, own a lot on Dance Mill Road in Baltimore County. Late in 1950, they decided to build a home on it, and entered into negotiations with several builders, including William G. Eurice & Bros., Inc., the appellee, which had been recommended by friends. They submitted stock plans and asked for an estimate — not a bid — to see whether the contemplated house was within their financial resources. John M. Eurice, its President, acted for the Eurice Corporation. He indicated at the first meeting that the cost of the house would be about
The Memorandum Specifications referred to in the contract, consisting of five pages and dated 14 February 1951, had been prepared by Mr. and Mrs. Ray, the night of the day the Eurice Corporation delivered its three-page proposal, and after Mr. Ray had said that his own lawyer would draw the contract. On the 14th of February the 9 January seven pages, as they had emerged from the green ink deletions and additions made at the meeting in January, were retyped and from the stencil so cut at the Ray apartment, Mr. Ray had many copies mechanically reproduced at the Martin Plant where he is an aeronautical engineer. The rewritten specifications were identified as they are designated in the contract, namely as “* * * Sheets 1 through 5, dated 14 February 1951.”
On February 22, at the office of the Eurice Corporation, on the Old Philadelphia Road, the contract was signed. Present, at the time, were Mr. Ray — Mrs. Ray was absent and had signed the contract earlier because she could not get a baby-sitter — Mr. John Eurice and Mr. Henry Eurice, who is Secretary of the Eurice Corporation. Mr. Ray relates the details of the meeting, as follows:
“I had copies, plans and specifications before me, as well , as two copies of the contract. Wesat down, Mr. John Eurice and I sat down and went over all of the items in the specifications. I volunteered to show him I had in fact changed the specifications to reflect their building idiosyncrasies, such as wanting to build the house with a poured cellar. We also went over the contract document item by item. Following that, we each signed the contract and Mr. Henry Eurice, being the other party there at the time, witnessed our signature. He was in the room during the entire discussion or review of the contract.”
After the contract had been signed, Mr. Ray says he asked that the Eurice brothers help him fill out the F.H.A. form of specifications (required to obtain the mortgage he needed) since he was not familiar with the intricacies of that form. This they did, with Mr. Henry Eurice giving most of the aid. They used the memorandum specifications of 14 February where they corresponded with the F.H.A. form and in other instances, as where the memorandum specifications were not adequate, Mr. Henry Eurice gave the necessary information. After the F.H.A. specifications were completed, the meeting broke up and a copy of the signed contract and copies of the Plans and Specifications were retained by the Eurice Corporation.
Mr. Ray then obtained a loan from the Loyola Savings & Loan Association. To do this it was necessary that he furnish it with his copy of the contract as well as copies of the Plans, the specifications of 14 February and the F.H.A. specifications. Neither the plans nor specifications which were left with the Building Association were signed by the Eurice Corporation, nor, through a misunderstanding, had they been signed by either Mr. or Mrs. Ray. When they applied for the loan, Mr. and Mrs. Ray did sign the reverse side of each page of the drawings and of the contract specifications. Thereafter, in response to a call from the Building Association, Mr. John Eurice went to its office and
Settlement of the mortgage loan was made on April 19 and thereafter, Mr. Ray phoned Mr. John Eurice repeatedly in order to set a starting date for the construction work. He finally came to the Ray home on April 22 and indicated that he would start construction sometime about the middle of May. Other details of the work were discussed and Mr. Ray was given the names of a plumber and a supply company so that he could pick out and buy direct various products which would be incorporated in the house. Mr. Eurice, at that time, brought up the question of a dry well which had not been noted in the specifications, and which was required by the Baltimore County Building Code, and Mr. Ray agreed that he would make allowance for this, as he felt it was an honest mistake.
On May 8, Mr. Ray received urgent messages from the Eurice Corporation that his presence was desired for a conference. As he walked into the office, Mr. Henry Eurice picked up the drawings, specifications and the contract, and threw them across the desk at him, and onto the floor, with the announcement that he had never seen them, and that if he had to build according to those specifications he did not propose to go ahead. Attempts were made at the meeting to iron out the differences which apparently caused Mr.. Henry Eurice to state that he would not live up to the contract. A second meeting was held at the Ray apartment several days later, and these efforts were continued by Mr. John Eurice, and that was the last contact that the Ray family had with any officer or agent of the Eurice Corporation. Realization that to build according to contract specifications would cost more than their usual “easy going, hatchet and saw manner” as Judge Gontrum described
“He said that he thought ours were better. I said ‘if we put that in your house how will we determine it was right or not?’ He said he would bring a camera and take a picture of the moldings in our shed and when they were constructed in the house take another picture, and see if it would correspond. I said, ‘Man, we can’t build you a house under those conditions. It is not reasonable.’ It created a heated argument for a while.”
After written notice by Mr. Ray’s lawyer to the lawyer for Eurice Corporation, that Mr. and Mrs. Ray considered that the contract had been breached and unless recognized within the week they would hold the Eurice Corporation “for any additional amount necessary to construct the house over and above the price called for in the agreement which has been breached by your client” had been ignored, suit was filed.
Mr. John Eurice agrees, in his testimony, that the Memorandum Sheets 1 to 7, dated January 9, had been gone over by him with Mr. and Mrs. Ray, but only as he says, to pick up “pointers”. He also agrees that he had been told that the contract was to be drawn by Mr. Ray’s lawyer, but says that he agreed only “so long as it is drawn up to our three page contract”. He says that no specifications were attached to the contract which was signed, at the time it was signed, and Mr.
Mr. Henry Eurice says that, although he was present at the time the contract was signed, and signed as a witness, that no specifications were attached to either copy of the signed contract, and that he did not see Specifications 1 to 5 until “right smart later, maybe a month.” When he did first see them “they were laying on the desk on the opened mail”.
Mr. John Eurice says in his testimony that the contract which was signed February 22 was not the proposal the Eurice Corporation had made. He sets forth that he read the contract of February 22 before, he signed it, and' he admits that he read paragraph B, whereby the builder agreed to construct the building strictly in accordance with the plans and specifications identified
On the basis of the testimony which has been cited at some length, Judge Gontrum found the following:
“The plaintiff, Mr. Ray, is an aeronautical engineer, a highly technical, precise gentleman, who has a truly remarkable memory for figures and dates and a meticulous regard for detail. Apparently, his profession and his training have schooled him to approach all problems in an exceedingly technical and probably very efficient manner. He testified with an exceptional fluency and plausibility. His mastery of language and recollection of dates and figures are phenomenal.
“The defendants in the case are what might be termed old fashioned country or community builders. Their work is technical but it doesn’t call for the specialized ability that Mr. Ray’s work demands. They conduct their business in a more easy going, hatchet and saw manner, and have apparently been successful in a small way in their field of home construction.
“The contract in question was entered into, in my judgment, in a hasty and rather careless fashion.”
Judge Gontrum then cites the testimony of the Eurice Brothers that they had not seen Specifications 1 through 5 when they signed, and then says:
“* * * There is real doubt in my mind about the matter. Why the defendants signed the agrément without checking up on the specifications, I do not know, but they clearly were under the impression that the specifications referred to in the agreement were the specifications they had submitted some time prior and which they had permitted to be redrafted by the attorney for Mr. Ray. They both stated with absolute emphasis, and I do not question their veracity, that they were under the impression that the specifications in the agreement were the same which they had prepared.”
He concludes by saying that he feels that Mr. and Mrs. Ray were under one impression, and that the Messrs. Eurice were under another impression, saying:
“* * * In my opinion there was an honest mistake; that there was no real meeting of the minds and that the plaintiffs and defendants had different sets of specifications in mind when this agreement was signed. The minds of the parties, so different in their approach, to use a mechanical phrase, did. not mesh.”
It is unnecessary to decide, as we see it, whether there was or was not a mistake on the part of the Eurice Corporation. It does strain credulity to hear that the Messrs. Eurice, builders all their adult lives and, on their own, successful builders for fifteen years of some twenty houses a year, would sign a simple contract to build a house, after they had read it, without knowing exactly what obligations they were assuming as to specifications requirements. The contract clearly referred to the specifications by designation, by number of pages and by date. It permits, in terms, no deviations from the specified makes or brands to be incorporated in the house, without the express permission of the owner. This would have been unimportant if the Eurice three-page specifications had been intended, since generality and not particularity was the emphasis there. Again, the contract could scarcely have intended to incorporate by reference the specifications in the three-page proposal because they were not set forth in a separate
If we assume the view as to mistake held by Judge' Gontrum, in effect the mistake in the written agreement which prevented its execution by the Eurice Corporation from making it a contract was an unilateral one. It consisted, in the opinion of the Court, in the Eurice Corporation thinking it was assenting to its own specifications, while in form it was assenting to the Ray specifications. If there was such a mistake, the legal result the Court found to follow, we think does not follow. The law is clear, absent fraud, duress or mutual mistake, that one having the capacity to understand a written document who reads and signs it, or, without reading it or having it read to him, signs it, is bound by his signature in law, at least. An integrated agreement may not be varied by parol where there is no mutual mistake, nor may the parties place their own interpretation on its meaning or intended meaning.
Neither fraud nor duress are in the case. If there was mistake it was unilateral. The Rays intended their specifications to be a part of the contract, and the contract so stated, so the misconception, if it existed, was in the minds of the Messrs. Eurice.
Williston-Contracts (Rev. Ed.), Sec. 1577—says as to unilateral mistake:
“But if a man acts negligently, and in such a way as to justify others in supposing that theterms of the writing are assented to by him and the writing is accepted on that supposition, he will be bound both at law and in equity. Accordingly, even if an illiterate executes a deed under a mistake as to its contents, he is bound if he did not require it to be read to him or its object explained.”
In Maryland there may be exceptions in proceedings for specific performance, but otherwise the rule is in accord.
Kappelman v. Bowie,
“One who makes a written offer which is accepted, or who manifests acceptance of the terms of a writing which he should reasonably understand to be an offer or proposed contract, is bound by the contract, though ignorant of the terms of the writing or of its proper interpretation.”
It does not lie in the mouth of the appellee, then, to say that it intended to be bound to build only according to its specifications. First, its claimed intent is immaterial, where it has agreed in writing to a clearly expressed and unambiguous intent to the contrary. Next, it may not vary that clearly expressed written intent by parol. And, finally, it may not put its own interpretation on the meaning of the written agreement it has executed. The Restatement-Contracts, Section 20, states the first proposition:
“A manifestation of mutual assent by the parties to an informal contract is essential to its formation and the acts by which such assent is manifested, must be done with the intent to do those acts, but * * * neither mental assent to the promises in the contract nor real or apparent intent that the promises shall be legally binding, is essential.”
Next, if a contract has been integrated, it may not be varied by parol in the absence of mutual mistake, nor will it be rescinded or redrafted by the Court if one of the parties finds that he has made a bad deal or has become dissatisfied with its provisions.
Vincent v. Palmer,
Finally, where there has been an integration of an agreement, those who executed it will not be allowed to place their own interpretation on what it means or was intended to mean. The test in such case is objective and not subjective.
Restatement-Contracts,
Sec. 230.
McKeever v. Realty Corp., supra,
at page 220 of
We conclude that the appellee wrongfully breached its contract to build the plaintiffs a house for $16,300.00. The measure of damage in such a case presents no difficulty.
Keystone Engineering Corp. v. Sutter,
196 Md.
Judgment reversed with costs and judgment entered for appellants against appellee in the sum of $5,993.40.-