Suttons Case Summary

This case begins with a couple that live in San Francisco, CA by the name of the Werner’s they obtained a 170,000 dollar loan on their house. The Werner’s had some friends another couple, the Suttons, one day the Werner’s proposed to the Sutton’s in regards to their house that if the Suttons’ were to put a $15,000 down payment toward the purchase price of their residence in which they were asking $185,000 for and pay the first five years of the mortgage and property taxes with the option to at any time purchase the residence. The Sutton’s agreed to this offer and both parties agreed on the terms orally. So in the beginning the Sutton’s paid the down payment and cash equal to the monthly mortgage during this time the Sutton’s had improvements

The courts stated that the statue of frauds purpose is to suppress fraud for instances cooked up claims of agreement, sometimes fathered by wish, imagined in the light of subsequent events and sometimes simply conjured up. In this case per the verbal contact that both parties had agreed to regarding that the Suttons could at any time during the first five years buy the property, but when the Werner’s reneged on the agreement, the Sutton’s sued and the Werner’s defended by alleging that the verbally agreement between both parties was not valid because there was not written contract. This was not ethical on the Werner’s behalf because the only reason that they reneged on the agreement was due to the increase value of the property, had the property depreciated or gone down in value the Werner’s would have acted or thought differently as this was not discussed in the beginning. In this case the doctrine of part performance, which states that if an oral contract for the sale of land or transfer another interest in real property to be specifically performed if it has been partially performed and performance is necessary to avoid injustice could be applied due to