[1] Deed—Building Restrictions—Quitclaim op Interest—Release op Restrictions.—Where the owner of a tract of land subdivided it into lots and blocks and made sales of the lots subject to certain building restrictions, and thereafter quitclaimed to the owner of one of the lots any interest he had therein, the effect of the deed was to release the restrictive provisions as to such lot so far as it was in the power of the original owner to do so.

[2] Id.—Enforcement op Building Restrictions—Right op Other Lot . Owners—Restrictions as Conditions.—Where a deed containing building restrictions provides that the property conveyed shall revert to the grantor, Ms heirs or assigns in case of - a breach of the restrictions, such provisions, if in fact conditions and not covenants, cannot be enforced by other lot owners under deeds from the same grantor and containing the same restrictions, against a lot owner who subsequent to his deed obtained from the original grantor a quitclaim deed to all Ms interest in the lot, for such reversion clause only runs in favor of the grantor, since by “assigns” is meant the assignees of the reversion or right of re-entry.

[3] Id.—Restrictions as Covenants.—Under such a deed, if such restrictive provisions amount to covenants, as well as conditions, there is no privity of contract between such lot owner and the other lot owners, nor is there privity of estate, af least in the usual sense of the word, for neither holds under or through the Others, and the restrictions are pot covenants running with the land, nor for the benefit of the estate conveyed but to its detriment.

[4] Id.—Enforcement of Covenants—Essentials.—In order that such restrictions have force, not merely as between the original parties, but as between such lot owner and the other lot owners, it must appear that their insertion in the deed by the original grantor was, in effect, the creation of what amounts to a servitude, to the burden of which the lot was subjected as the servient tenement, and to the benefit of which the remainder of the tract was entitled as the dominant tenement.

[5] Id.—Equitable Easements—Origin.—The enforcement of covenants restricting the use of one parcel of land for the benefit of another parcel, not merely as between the original parties, but as between their respective grantees between whom no privity of estate or of contract can properly be said to exist, originated at a comparatively recent date in the chancery courts and apparently without a clear appreciation of the fact that the enforcement of such covenants for and against grantees of the original parties was, in effect, the creating of servitudes.

[6] Id.—Enforcement of Equitable Servitudes.—Such servitudes frequently spoken of as “equitable easements” are opposed to the rule that the owner of land may not create new and heretofore unknown estates, and their enforcement is limited to those which directly concern and benefit the dominant tenement, and any provisions of an instrument creating or claiming to create such a servitude will be strictly construed, any doubt being resolved in favor of the free use of the land.

[7] Id.—Equitable Servitude—When not Created.—A servitude running with the land in favor of one parcel and against another is not created where the owner of a tract of land sells a portion of it, exacting of the grantee restrictive provisions as to its use, but without a word indicating that the land conveyed is a part of a larger tract, the balance of which the grantor still retains, or that the restrictions are intended for the benefit of other lands, or that their benefit is to inure to or pass with other lands, and without any description or designation of the land which is to be the dominant tenement.

[8] Id.—Creation of Mutual Equitable Servitudes.—When the owner of a subdivided tract conveys the various parcels in 'the tract by deeds containing appropriate language imposing restrictions on each parcel as part of a general plan of restrictions common to all the parcels and designed for their mutual benefit, mutual equitable servitudes are thereby created in favor of each parcel as against all the others, for the agreement between the grantor and each grantee in such a case as expressed in the instruments between them is both that the parcel conveyed shall be subject to restrictions in accordance with the plan for the benefit of all the other parcels and also that all other parcels shall be subject to such restrictions for its benefit.

[9] Id.—Time op Creation.—In such a case the mutual servitudes spring into existence as between the first parcel conveyed and the balance of the parcels at the time of the first conveyance, and as each conveyance follows, the burden and the benefit of the mutual restrictions imposed by preceding conveyances as between the particular parcel conveyed and those previously conveyed pass as an incident of the ownership of the parcel, and similar restrictions are created by the conveyance as between the lot conveyed and the lots still retained by the original owner.

[10] Id.—Creation op Equitable Servitudes—Joint Intent op Parties.—Where the owner of a tract of land sells a lot subject to building restrictions, but without any language in the deed which refers to a common plan of restrictions or which expresses or. in any way indicates an agreement between grantor and grantee that the lot conveyed is taken subject to any such plan, it is immaterial, as affecting the question whether the restriction runs personally to the owner and not to the owners of other lots in the tract, that the owner in selling lots from time to time in each conveyance has exacted restrictive covenants, evidently in accord with a eom- ! mon plan. It is not the grantor’s intent alone that governs, but the joint intent of himself and his grantees, and such intent j must be expressed in the instruments which constitute the final memorials of their understanding.

[11] Id.—Judgment—Quieting Title—Bight op Plaintifp.—In an action to quiet title against building restrictions, a judgment which goes further than denying plaintiff relief and affirmatively makes his title subject to the restrictions cannot be justified on the ground that the action of the plaintiff in seeking to escape from the re.^-“““st-rietions is inequitable, where such restrictions do not in fact exist,