67 S.W.2d 7 | Ky. Ct. App. | 1934
Affirming.
In the month of December, 1929, Jesse Richardson, Daniel C. Richardson, and Gentry Richardson brought suit against Jeffie Richardson to recover the balance due on a note on which they were sureties for Jeffie Richardson, and to subject certain real estate in Estill county to the payment of their debt. Jeffie Richardson and his wife, Elizabeth Richardson, were at that time living in Hamilton, Ohio, and were proceeded against *236 as nonresidents. After they had been notified of the nature and pendency of the action, they returned to Kentucky, and, in addition to other defenses not now material, asserted a homestead in the property sought to be sold. The claim of homestead was disallowed, and from that judgment this appeal is prosecuted.
The facts are these: The two tracts of land sought to be subjected were worth less than $1,000. One of these tracts containing 20 acres appellant purchased from Spicy Clarkston and others. In the other tract, consisting of about 20 acres, appellant owns an undivided five-sevenths interest, one-seventh of which he inherited from his father, Levi Richardson, and the other four-sevenths he purchased from the heirs of his father. The two tracts do not adjoin, but are separated by a third tract, formerly a portion of his father's estate, on which his mother, he, and his two children lived in 1920. Appellant did not erect a home on either of the tracts, but cultivated them while living with his mother. In 1920 appellant moved to Ravenna, bought a home there, known as the Poplar street property, and resided in that home for 5 or 6 years. He then moved to the property on the pike known as the Cedar Grove property, where he kept house for a year and a half with his mother. After the house at Cedar Grove was burned, he went to Ohio, where he married in 1928. Immediately after their marriage he and his wife rented rooms, procured furniture, and kept house. After remaining there for 23 months, they returned to Kentucky after this suit was brought, and took up their residence with appellant's mother on the small tract between the two tracts in controversy. Appellant testified that he left his home only temporarily, always intended to return, and that since 1930 he had intended to build on the property, but did not have the money.
Though it be true that the homestead statute is liberally construed in favor of the homestead claimant, Williams v. Evans' Adm'r,
It follows that the judgment was proper.
Judgment affirmed.