Court Opinion

ID: 9584600
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:50:34.780388+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:10:18.345109
License: Public Domain

*462On Motion for Rehearing.
It is contended in the motion to rehear that, since a natural person cannot do business as a corporation, the certificate of the Real Estate Commission adds nothing to the original license, and that this license shows on its face that it was issued to an individual only. The license, however, is issued to the “above named” individual or corporation, and there is a place, on it for both an individual name and a firm (or corporate) name. Thus, both names appear on the single license. This accords with the law in that the real estate corporation can act only through its brokers, and the payment of a single fee entitles both the corporation and one of its officers, if the latter is a broker, to transact the business of selling real estate.
In Padgett v. Silver Lake Park Corp., 168 Ga. 759, 762 (149 SE 180) the following appears: “So, we are of the opinion that the legislature intended, in passing the acts of 1925 and 1927, to create a Georgia real-estate commission which would investigate each and every person applying for a license as a corporation or individual as a real-estate broker or salesman, and look into the fitness of such applicant for license in respect to his character, reputation, and experience, in order to ascertain whether or not from such investigation the applicant is of good character, competent, and trustworthy, and, if so, to grant him a license to sell real estate; and, if after investigation this commission should find to the contrary, that it would deny such person a license if he was found incompetent or untrustworthy.” (Emphasis added). Our courts have thus recognized what every man knows in fact and what the Real Estate Commission by its regulations has adopted in practice, that, although there are provisions in our law for the licensing of corporations, like individuals, as real estate brokers, nevertheless a corporation cannot sell real estate except through a broker, for the license to the corporation entitles only one representative thereof to “engage in the business of a real estate broker within the meaning of this chapter.” Code § 84-1415. A corporation applying for a license as broker must furnish an application verified by a corporate officer. Code § 84-1410.
Granted that the wording, both of the act and of the li*463cense, is ambiguous, after verdict any ambiguity in evidence should, if possible, be construed to uphold rather than to defeat the action. The act itself, as construed by the Padgett case, places the emphasis on the natural rather than the artificial person, although the two are inextricably interrelated. It is the individual as well as the corporate applicant who must be of good reputation and experience; it is the individual rather than the corporation as such who must have had 12 months’ experience as a sales person. Code § 84-1409.
The statement in the motion to rehear is not accurate that “an individual cannot do business as a corporation.” It was stated in Williamson v. Gentry, 44 Ga. App. 596 (1) (162 SE 395): “A person doing business under a trade name may bring suit in that name as his trade name. This is true although the trade name may be that of a corporation in which the person doing business in that name owns all the capital stock.”
A judgment against one in his trade name is not void, as a person may sue and be sued in such trade name. Charles v. Valdosta Foundry &c. Co., 4 Ga. App. 733 (2) (62 SE 493). The certificate of the Real Estate Commission showing that J. H. Wilson was doing business as North Fulton Realty Co., Inc., was admitted without objection; if it were necessary to this case to hold that the license issued was in fact a license to an individual rather than a corporation, this would constitute some evidence that the individual was in fact doing business under the corporate trade name which he would have had a right to use as the party bringing the action. From this it follows that the verdict was not without evidence to support it on the ground that the plaintiff was not licensed. If, as we here hold, the license is a corporate as well as an individual license, the question does not arise; if an individual license, the broker was doing business under the trade name in which the suit was brought.

Motion denied.