Court Opinion

ID: 9584063
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:44:22.899721+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:06:35.109658
License: Public Domain

*181JUSTICE WHITING,
dissenting.
I cannot agree that “the evidence presented no cognizable claim supporting the trial court’s action.” Further, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that Owen “has failed to produce sufficient evidence in support of his prayer for relief [and that] as a matter of law a resulting trust did not arise.” The evidence shows, indeed, and Tiller admitted, that Owen’s delivery of the two checks totaling $23,000 was, in the language of the majority, “for the down payment on the house.”
And “it is well settled that when one person pays . . . the purchase price money, or a part thereof, for property” deeded to another, a resulting trust may arise. Kellow v. Bumgardner, 196 Va. 247, 254, 83 S.E.2d 391, 395 (1954) (emphasis added). Indeed,
[i]n order to establish a resulting trust arising from the payment of purchase money by another, it is not necessary that the beneficiary should have furnished the whole of the purchase money, nor an exact aliquot part thereof. If the amount paid is certain, a trust will result with respect to an undivided share of the land proportioned to his share of the whole price. Miller v. Miller, 99 Va. 125, 37 S.E. 792.
Neathery v. Neathery, 114 Va. 650, 656, 77 S.E. 465, 468 (1913). Moreover,
[n]othing else appearing, the title holder is prima facie presumed to hold the title in trust for the party who purchased and paid the purchase money. However, the so-called purchaser must have paid the purchase money as his own and not as an agent of the title holder, nor as a loan or gift to the latter.
Kellow, 196 Va. at 254, 83 S.E.2d at 395. Here, it is obvious that the trial court found from credible, albeit conflicting, evidence that Owen’s $23,000 transfer for the down payment was not a gift to Tiller as she claimed, and there is nothing to show that Owen was acting as Tiller’s agent.
However, instead of imposing a resulting trust of a proportionate interest in Tiller’s property in Owen’s favor (as it could have done), the court merely imposed an equitable lien. Tiller’s objec*182tion is not that this was an inappropriate form of relief, but that “Owen should not be granted the benefit of a resulting trust or a lien on the property because he did not bind himself to pay the purchase money and because he gave that money as a gift to Vivian Tiller.” The trial court did not accept this argument and neither do I. For the reasons stated, I do not think that Owen had to obligate himself to pay the balance of the entire purchase price in order to establish a resulting trust for the amounts he had already paid.
Because Tiller did not object to the form of the relief, I would affirm the chancellor’s award.* Rule 5:25.

 If an equitable lien could not be imposed upon Tiller’s property, I would reverse the award of an equitable lien but enter a money judgment in the amount of the lien. Code § 8.01-681 (Supreme Court can reverse judgment in part if erroneous, enter such judgment as seems right and proper, and render final judgment on merits if it has sufficient facts to do so); Iron City Bank v. Isaacsen, 158 Va. 609, 625-26, 164 S.E. 520, 523 (1932) (equity court can establish legal rights and administer legal remedies even though proof shows complainant not entitled to equitable relief); see Gulfstream Building Assocs. v. Britt, 239 Va. 178, 185, 387 S.E.2d 488, 492 (1990).