221 Pa. 622 | Pa. | 1908
Opinion by
The assignments of error to be considered relate to the effect of the statute of frauds on the contract on which a recovery was allowed. The facts as established by the verdict are
Facts, which if admitted would givé rise to an implied or resulting trust, may be proved orally; otherwise the exception of those trusts from the statute of frauds would be inoperative. A trust will spring from the fraud practiced where one employed to negotiate for another takes advantage of the opportunity to obtain a conveyance to himself. Whether in this case the acquiescence of the plaintiff in the taking of title by the defendant left him anything to rely upon except an unwritten promise to hold the land for him need not be considered, for a trust also arose from the payment of the purchase money, which could be established by parol evidence. Where an agent to buy land uses his own money to complete the purchase, the transaction will be regarded as a loan to the principal. Nor does the fact that he pays in full out of his own funds necessarily exclude the operation of the principle: Notes to Dyer v. Dyer, 1 Leading Oases in Equity, *203.
The verdict should be sustained also on the ground taken by the learned judge in submitting the case to the jury, that .the action was not for land, and did not involve the title to land, but was for profits made by the sale of land, which, were in.
The judgment is affirmed.