Court Opinion

ID: 9560682
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:53:36.493529+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:13:05.959349
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE LACY,
dissenting.
Notwithstanding the majority’s pronouncement that “default” and “breach” are one and the same, I continue to believe that these terms are well understood and widely accepted to reflect separate concepts. Default embraces a failure to perform, while breach contemplates an imperfect performance.
The contract in issue was one under which Clevert agreed to purchase a house built and sold to them by Soden. That occurred; the contract was performed. The contractual paragraph entitled “DEFAULT” provided that only a “defaulting party” could be *113held liable for attorney’s fees incurred by a “non-defaulting party.”
As stated by the trial court, this litigation
is a breach of contract, suitability of materials suit and workmanlike manner in which the place was built. That is not a default case and the Court finds no evidence of default from this case. The contract has been performed but not to the satisfaction of the plaintiff, of course.
In the Court’s view, breach of contract is not default of the contract, and the Court finds from the language that the attorney fees were from default in the contract and they did not extend beyond that.
In my opinion the majority has strained to give the term “default” a gloss which was never contemplated by these litigants when they signed this real estate contract and which is not its “usual, ordinary and popular meaning.” Ames v. American Nat’l Bank of Portsmouth, 163 Va. 1, 39, 176 S.E. 204, 217 (1934). I dissent.