Santoro

*726 Opinion

Plaintiff commenced an action to quiet title to- real property conveyed by grant deed dated March 24, 1965, to plaintiff and defendant as joint tenants. In the complaint it was alleged that plaintiff had purchased the property and caused title to be placed in the names of the parties as joint tenants, in reliance on defendant’s false representation that if plaintiff did so defendant would remarry him. Defendant filed an answer alleging as a purported affirmative defense (1) that the complaint did not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action, and, as a further affirmative defense, (2) that plaintiff was estopped to claim false representations on the part of defendant because when the property was purchased plaintiff was married to another woman. Defendant also filed a cross-complaint seeking partition of the property and an accounting of rents collected by plaintiff.

The action was tried without a jury. Explanatory evidence was introduced showing: plaintiff and defendant were married in Massachusetts in September 1945, and had two children. In 1960 the family moved to California. The parties were separated in 1963. Defendant then went to Massachusetts…