Woman's Home & Foreign Missionary Society v. Bank of America National Trust & Savings Ass'n

In this action to quiet title to a lot in San Diego the court made findings and entered judgment in favor of the plaintiff and the defendants have appealed on the judgment-roll alone.

On July 17, 1925, Sarah Tenney, being then 80 years of age, executed a grant deed conveying the property in question to the respondent, this deed reserving to the grantor “the free use and occupancy of the said premises as a residence for herself so long as she may live”. This deed was delivered to a third person with instructions to hold the same until the death of the grantor and then deliver it to the respondent. On October 30, 1926, the said Sarah Tenney served a notice upon the respondent grantee and *684 the escrow holder declaring that this deed had been executed, acknowledged and delivered by her through inadvertence and mistake of fact and declaring that said purported deed of gift was thereby cancelled, demanding a return of the same and asserting that she would not surrender the possession of the property to them or either of them, and “that I have, claim and exercise the absolute ownership and control of the property described in said purported deed with full power to sell, pledge, give,…