Mazzera

Plaintiff has appealed from a judgment , decreeing that defendants are the owners of a vacant lot, 50 feet in width, which lies between two pieces of property separately owned by the respective parties.

The complaint alleged that plaintiff and defendants orally agreed that defendants, who are husband and wife, were to purchase the lot for the mutual benefit of the parties and to convey an undivided one-half interest to plaintiff upon payment of one-half of the costs, and that defendants purchased the lot but refused to accept plaintiff’s tender of half the costs or to make a conveyance. A second count was in the usual form of a quiet title action. Plaintiff asked that a trust be decreed as to the one-half interest and that he be adjudged the owner thereof.

Defendant Ed Wolf testified that he met plaintiff Mazzera on the lot in April, 1944. They had not become acquainted until shortly before this date, and they had not had any prior business transactions, except that Wolf, who was renting the lot, permitted Mazzera to use a portion of it for storing materials at a monthly rental of $10. Mazzera asked Wolf why he did not buy the lot, to which he replied that the owners wanted too…

I dissent.

The issue presented in this case is whether any reasonable inference may be drawn other than one supporting, contrary to the trial court’s judgment, a constructive trust or resulting trust.

There is no substantial dispute between Mazzera and Wolf that they had an oral agreement that Wolf should, buy the property for the joint benefit of the parties. But in addition to that, any conflict there may have been in the evidence with regard to that agreement has been resolved by the trial court in its findings. It found: “Plaintiff and Defendant Ed Wolf met casually upon the . . . [Gilbeau] lot and held a general conversation with each other on various subjects, in the course of which conversation Plaintiff proposed to Defendant Ed Wolf that, he; Wolf, endeavor to purchase the lot from the owner, taking title in his own name, and that they would then go fifty fifty in the property, each taking an undivided one-half interest. To this proposal Defendant Ed Wolf assented.” Fortifying that finding is the opinion of the trial judge. He there stated that the decision of the case “turns on a question of law” as the “essential facts, except for minor *539 variations in the testimony…

Plaintiff has appealed from a judgment decreeing that defendants are the owners of a vacant lot, 50 feet in width, which lies between two pieces of property separately owned by the respective parties.

The complaint alleged that plaintiff and defendants orally agreed that defendants, who are husband and wife, were to purchase the lot for the mutual benefit of the parties and to convey an undivided one-half interest to plaintiff upon payment of one-half of the costs, and that defendants purchased the lot but refused to accept plaintiff's tender of half the costs or to make a conveyance. A second count was in the usual form of a quiet title action. Plaintiff asked that a trust be decreed as to the one-half interest and that he be adjudged the owner thereof.

Defendant Ed Wolf testified that he met plaintiff Mazzera on the lot in April, 1944. They had not become acquainted until shortly before this date, and they had not had any prior business transactions, except that Wolf, who was renting the lot, permitted Mazzera to use a portion of it for storing materials at a monthly rental of $10. Mazzera asked Wolf why he did not buy the lot, to which he replied that the owners…