Court Opinion

ID: 9558281
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:05:57.421691+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:08:37.287336
License: Public Domain

Durham, J.
(dissenting) — I concur in the majority's holding that the remedy of specific performance is not available for the breach of a purchase and sale agreement if the parties have not agreed to the material terms of their ultimate *28contract. I also agree that this principle, set forth in Hubbell v. Ward, 40 Wn.2d 779, 246 P.2d 468 (1952), applies with the same force to a sale involving a note and deed of trust as it does to a sale involving a real estate contract. However, I do not agree that this rule precludes the remedy of specific performance in this case, and I respectfully dissent.
In Hubbell, this court held that specific performance of a purchase and sale agreement is not available in the absence of agreement on all material terms of the contemplated real estate contract. We refused to order specific performance, because to do so would have required the trial court to supply the terms of the contemplated contract for the parties. The majority interprets Hubbell to require that all the material terms of the parties' ultimate contract be included in the purchase and sale agreement. I disagree with this interpretation. Hubbell requires only that the parties have agreed to all material terms. So long as there is other admissible evidence of those agreed terms, a purchase and sale agreement is subject to specific performance.
My interpretation of Hubbell is consistent with the cases since decided. In Paullus v. Fowler, 59 Wn.2d 204, 367 P.2d 130 (1961), specific performance was ordered on an option to purchase real property. The option clause in the buyer's lease did not specify all of the terms the parties contemplated including in the real estate contract, and the lessor did not execute one. However, this court found that the parties had agreed to all material terms of the real estate contract and that evidence of these terms could be found in the escrow instructions prepared by the lessor. Paullus, at 212-13. Similarly, in Haire v. Patterson, 63 Wn.2d 282, 287, 386 P.2d 953 (1963), this court indicated that specific performance of the purchase and sale agreement would have been granted if the buyer had proven agreement to the missing terms by written or parol evidence.
If we were to consider only the purchase and sale agreement executed by the parties, the remedy of specific performance would not be available to the Setterlunds. *29However, there is other evidence that the material terms of their ultimate contract were agreed to by the parties. The buyers allege that they approved a form note and deed of trust when they signed the purchase and sale agreement. These forms were not provided to the sellers when the sellers signed the purchase and sale agreement. However, the buyers allege that the sellers orally modified the provision in the purchase and sale agreement which required that the note and deed of trust be attached, and agreed that the forms were to be mailed to the sellers for approval. Buyers further allege that the sellers made no objection to these forms and that identical forms were executed by the buyers at closing. This is evidence that the terms in the note and deed of trust signed by the buyers at closing were the terms agreed to by both parties. Thus, the court is no longer in a position in which it must specify terms for the parties. It need only determine if these terms were, in fact, agreed to. If that is the case, the remedy of specific performance may be available.
Unfortunately, the buyers failed to offer this evidence in their case in chief. Realizing the oversight when the sellers made a motion to dismiss, buyers' counsel offered to reopen to present the required evidence. After argument, the trial court refused to allow the buyers to reopen and granted the sellers' motion to dismiss. This was error.
Generally, a trial court's ruling on a motion to reopen for further evidence will not be overturned absent an abuse of discretion. Fuller v. Ostruske, 48 Wn.2d 802, 808, 296 P.2d 996 (1956). Here, however, the trial court's decision was based on a misinterpretation of the rule in Hubbell. The trial court assumed that the additional evidence offered by the buyers was immaterial, reasoning that even if the seller had agreed to the use of a particular form note and deed of trust several days after the purchase and sale agreement had been signed, this could not correct the deficiencies in the purchase and sale agreement at the time of signing. In reaching this conclusion, the trial court confused the specificity required for a contract to be valid with that required *30for a contract to be specifically enforced. Evidence, other than the purchase and sale agreement, that the parties had agreed to the specific terms of the note and deed of trust signed at closing is relevant to determining if the parties had agreed to all material terms of their ultimate contract, and the trial court should have allowed the buyers to reopen their case and present this evidence.
To deny buyers the remedy of specific performance as a matter of law in this case, as does the majority, creates uncertainty as to the enforceability of every purchase and sale agreement and weakens an instrument essential to most real estate transactions. For this reason, I would remand with directions to the trial court to allow the buyers to present evidence that the parties had agreed to the use of the form note and deed of trust signed by the Set-terlunds at the closing. If this can be proven, the buyers may be entitled to specific performance.
Pearson, J., concurs with Durham, J.