Source: http://lawlibrary.chanrobles.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82509:56384&catid=1576&Itemid=566
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 15:58:58+00:00

Document:
G.R. No. 198718, November 27, 2013 - SPOUSES TEODORO AND ROSARIO SARAZA AND FERNANDO SARAZA, Petitioners, v. WILLIAM FRANCISCO, Respondent.
SPOUSES TEODORO AND ROSARIO SARAZA AND FERNANDO SARAZA, Petitioners, v. WILLIAM FRANCISCO, Respondent.
This is a petition for review on certiorari1 under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court, which assails the Decision2 dated June 28, 2011 and Resolution3 dated September 30, 2011 of the Court of Appeals (CA) in CA-G.R. CV No. 93961. The assailed decision and resolution of the CA affirmed the Decision4 dated June 5, 2009 of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Imus, Cavite, Branch 20, in Civil Case No. 0319-04, an action for specific performance/sum of money and damages.
The RTC held that contrary to the petitioners’ claim, the respondent’s full payment of the P3,200,000.00 consideration provided in the Agreement was supported by: (1) the petitioners’ acknowledgment in the Agreement that they received the amount of P1,200,000.00 upon its execution; and (2) the Certification from PNB that the full amount of Spouses Saraza’s loan with the bank had been fully paid.
4.3 the costs of suit.
The CA affirmed the RTC rulings via the Decision dated June 28, 2011. The CA rejected the petitioners’ allegation that the amount of P1,200,000.00 remained unpaid by the respondent, citing the stipulation in their Agreement which provided that the said amount was paid upon the contract’s execution.
Petitioner Fernando’s Motion for Reconsideration19 was denied by the CA in the Resolution dated September 30, 2011.20 Hence, this petition for review on certiorari.
The main issue for the Court’s resolution is: Whether or not the petitioners are bound to comply with their obligations to the respondent as embodied in their Agreement dated September 1, 1999.
It is imperative to look into the respondent’s compliance with his covenants under the subject Agreement in order to ascertain whether or not he can compel the petitioners to satisfy their respective undertakings.
The respondent’s obligation under the Agreement pertains to the payment of the P3,200,000.00 consideration for Fernando’s corresponding duty of executing a Deed of Sale over the property formerly covered by TCT No. 40376. To dispute the respondent’s claim that he has satisfied said obligation, the petitioners now raise factual issues which the Court however emphasizes are not for the Court to reassess. For one, the issue of whether or not the respondent’s obligation to pay has already been satisfied is a factual question.
In addition to the foregoing, the petitioners’ plain denial of the respondent’s claim of full payment is self-serving, belied by their admission that they had not at anytime demanded from the respondent the payment of P1,200,000.00. The petitioners are presumed under the law to have taken ordinary care of their concerns;26 thus, they would have exerted efforts to demand payment of the amount due them if in fact, no payment had been made. Moreover, given this presumption, the petitioners were supposed to be wary of the import of affixing their signature on the Agreement, and would not have voluntarily signed the subject Agreement if they did not intend to give full effect thereto.
The petitioners also raise in their Supplemental Petition27 some defenses which were not introduced during the proceedings before the lower courts. These pertain to the alleged failure of Spouses Saraza to fully understand the contents of the Agreement as these were written in English, and their claim that the Agreement was a contract of adhesion for having been prepared solely by the respondent. Basic is the rule, however, that no issue may be raised on appeal unless it has been brought before the lower tribunals for consideration.28 To consider such issues and arguments that are belatedly raised by a party would be tantamount to a blatant disregard of the basic principles of fair play, justice and due process.29 In any case, the new defenses that are raised by the petitioners deserve scant consideration. There is no claim that the cited language limitation equally applied to the respondent, the principal party in the Agreement. Contrary to the petitioners’ stance, the Agreement also does not appear to be a contract where the petitioners had no opportunity to question its terms, negotiate or decline its execution. The bare allegations of the petitioners fail to suffice.
Based on available evidence, it is then clear that the respondent had fully satisfied his obligation under the subject Agreement given the stipulation in the document on his initial payment of P1,200,000.00, and considering PNB’s Certification30 that the P2,000,000.00 loan of Spouses Saraza with the bank had been fully settled on April 22, 2005. Fernando, being equally bound by the terms of the document, was correctly ordered by the RTC and the CA to duly comply with his own obligation under the contract, particularly the obligation to execute a deed of sale over his 100-sq m property in Bangkal, Makati City. The respondent’s satisfaction of his obligation under the Agreement also rendered unmeritorious the petitioners’ counterclaim for damages.
As to the issue of venue, the petitioners’ argument that the action should have been instituted with the RTC of Makati City, and not the RTC of Imus, Cavite, is misplaced. Although the end result of the respondent’s claim was the transfer of the subject property to his name, the suit was still essentially for specific performance, a personal action, because it sought Fernando’s execution of a deed of absolute sale based on a contract which he had previously made.
[I]n La Tondeña Distillers, Inc. v. Ponferrada, private respondents filed an action for specific performance with damages before the RTC of Bacolod City. The defendants allegedly reneged on their contract to sell to them a parcel of land located in Bago City – a piece of property which the latter sold to petitioner while the case was pending before the said RTC. Private respondent did not claim ownership but, by annotating a notice of lis pendens on the title, recognized defendants’ ownership thereof. This Court ruled that the venue had properly been laid in the RTC of Bacolod, even if the property was situated in Bago.
The Court compared these two cases with the case of National Steel Corporation v. Court of Appeals34 where the Court held that an action that seeks the execution of a deed of sale over a parcel of land is for recovery of real property, and not for specific performance, because the primary objective is to regain ownership and possession of the property.35 It was explained that the prayer in National Steel was not in any way connected to a contract that was previously executed by the party against whom the complaint was filed, unlike in Cabutihan where the parties had earlier executed an Undertaking for the property’s transfer, correctly giving rise to a cause of action either for specific performance or for rescission, as in this case.
Section 2, Rule 4 of the Rules of Court then governs the venue for the respondent’s action. It provides that personal actions “may be commenced and tried where the plaintiff or any of the principal plaintiffs resides, or where the defendant or any of the principal defendants resides, or in the case of a non-resident defendant where he may be found, at the election of the plaintiff.” Considering the respondent’s statement in his complaint that he resides in Imus, Cavite,36 the filing of his case with the RTC of Imus was proper.
The Court, however, modifies the lower courts’ award of damages in favor of the respondent. In the assailed decision, the CA affirmed the RTC’s award of the following amounts: (1) P100,000.00 as damages; (2) P177,000.00 as attorney’s fees; and (3) costs of suit.
The claim in the complaint was for “moral and compensatory damages”, yet the RTC failed to indicate whether the P100,000.00 was for the moral damages for the “undue anxiety, mental anguish and wounded feelings”38, or compensatory damages for the “actual business losses due to disruption of his business”39 as alleged by the respondent in his Amended Complaint. More importantly, there is no showing that such allegations were sufficiently substantiated by the respondent, rendering the deletion of the award warranted.
2 Penned by Associate Justice Remedios A. Salazar-Fernando, with Associate Justices Celia C. Librea-Leagogo and Michael P. Elbinias, concurring; id. at 23-42.
4 Issued by Presiding Judge Fernando Felicen; id. at 70-75.
21Medina v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 137582, August 29, 2012, 679 SCRA 191, 201.
22 Id.; Samaniego-Celada v. Abena, 579 Phil. 60, 66 (2008), citing Ontimare, Jr. v. Spouses Elep, 515 Phil. 237, 245-246 (2006).
24 RULES OF COURT, Rule 131, Section 3(m).
25Seaoil Petroleum Corporation v. Autocorp Group, G.R. No. 164326, October 17, 2008, 569 SCRA 387, 395.
26 Rules of Court, Rule 131, Section 3(d).
28Buklod nang Magbubukid sa Lupaing Ramos, Inc. v. E.M. Ramos and Sons, Inc., G.R. No. 131481, March 16, 2011, 645 SCRA 401, 455.
29Office of the President v. Cataquiz, G.R. No. 183445, September 14, 2011, 657 SCRA 681, 705-706, citing Madrid v. Mapoy, G.R. No. 150887, August 14, 2009, 596 SCRA 14, 28.
31 432 Phil. 927 (2002).
34 362 Phil. 150 (1999).

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