Court Opinion

ID: 9603524
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:07:02.803046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:12.668261
License: Public Domain

Justice Whiting,
dissenting.
I cannot agree with the majority’s opinion for three reasons. First, it rewards the negligence of buyers who, almost three years after they should have done so, finally asked to see a document which they were required to be satisfied with as a condition of closing. Second, it penalizes the sellers who supplied what they, in good faith, thought was required of them. Third, it ignores the fact that the buyers’ agent knowingly accepted a performance differing from that explicitly required as a pre-condition to the buyers’ closing the sale.
Because “a satisfactory percolation test prior to closing” was a contingency solely for the buyers’ benefit, it was their duty to ask to see it prior to closing. Instead of doing so, they relied on the word of the sellers’ real estate agent that a satisfactory percolation test had been performed. Yet, as the majority points out, no one *339knew what would satisfy the buyers. Since the majority criticizes the selling agent’s husband’s choice of a location for the house and the number of proposed bedrooms, I assume it believes the buyers should have made those choices.
Mr. Bergmueller said he knew what was involved in a percolation test; therefore, he must have known that he, or someone acting on his behalf, would have to: (1) choose a spot for the house in order to see whether the nearby land would “perk”; and (2) know the number of proposed bedrooms, which would impact upon whether any percolation test would be satisfactory to him.-Yet he' made no attempt to determine whether the agent’s allegedly satisfactory percolation test took account of these factors.
Although the concept of waiver is not applicable, I believe the evidence demonstrates that the buyers should be estopped from asserting the inadequacy of the percolation test after completely accepting the agent’s representations regarding this contractual pre-condition. “One who has, with knowledge of the options open to him, elected to assume one position is thereafter estopped to assume an inconsistent position to the prejudice of another who has been led to rely upon his first position.” Employers Ins. Co. v. Great American, 214 Va. 410, 413, 200 S.E.2d 560, 563 (1973) (citing Thrasher v. Thrasher, 210 Va. 624, 172 S.E.2d 771 (1970)). As mentioned above, the buyers’ agent knew what was necessary for a satisfactory percolation test, yet did not exercise the buyers’ contractual right to ensure that appropriate factors were taken into consideration in performing the test. Instead, he chose to rely on the sellers’ blanket representations regarding the sufficiency of the testing that was done. For this reason, the buyers should be estopped from raising the lack of a percolation test so long after closing.
Allowing the buyers to raise the lack of a percolation test almost three years after they should have asked for it, rewards their negligence and penalizes the sellers’ good faith in trying to supply what they thought the buyers wanted.
As the majority points out, the buyers constituted Mr. Weissenborn as their agent for the closing. The evidence supports the trial court’s finding that Mr. Weissenborn “was aware of the requirement for a percolation test . . . and knowing that a health permit had been issued it was his opinion that the condition had been met. He made no distinction between a health permit to install a sewage disposal system and a satisfactory percolation test.” *340In my opinion, based on these facts, the buyers should be estopped from asserting the lack of a percolation test at this late date, no matter what the agent’s closing statement said.
For the foregoing reasons, I would affirm the judgment.