Court Opinion

ID: 9763271
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:39:54.320392+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:40.303159
License: Public Domain

SPEARS, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the judgment of the Court denying recovery to Wilemon and Mahoney.
I disagree, however, with the majority’s view that A.H. Belo Corp. v. Sanders, 632 *906S.W.2d 145 (Tex.1982), necessarily controls the disposition of this case. In Helo, the only damages the plaintiff sought in his slander of title action were for impairment of vendibility of his land. In denying his recovery, we applied the “general rule longstanding in Texas” that proof showing only impairment of vendibility does not establish a right to damages. Id at 146. The sound basis for that long-standing rule is that a plaintiff’s only damages in a slander of title action are special damages in the form of pecuniary losses, Louis v. Blalock, 543 S.W.2d 715, 717 (Tex.Civ.App.—Amarillo 1976, writ ref’d n.r.e.), which must be proven with sufficient certainty and particularity to avoid the need for speculation or conjecture by the fact finder. Houston Chronicle Publishing Co. v. Martin, 5 S.W.2d 170, 174 (Tex.Civ.App.—El Paso 1928, writ dism’d) (“In [slander of title actions] there is a reason for the rule [generally requiring proof of loss of a pending sale] because the intrinsic or market value of the property itself is not ordinarily affected.”). Absent such proof, there is no adequate way to determine whether the defendant’s wrongful conduct actually caused the plaintiff to suffer pecuniary losses, and if so, the amount of those losses. For this reason, I believe Belo was correctly decided.
In this case, however, Wilemon and Ma-honey did not allege that Ellis’s malicious conduct had prevented them from selling their land to some specific buyer. They conceded that they had no desire to sell the property. Instead, they alleged that Ellis’s malicious assertion of a right of first refusal on that land had prevented them from obtaining a specific development loan in the amount of $50,000 to $60,000, for which the land was to be used as collateral. Wilemon and Mahoney claimed that certain lenders would not grant their request for financing unless they secured title insurance and that two title insurance companies refused to give them such insurance because of Ellis’s claim.
I know of no case decided by a Texas court in which the plaintiff was either allowed or denied recovery in a slander of title action after proving that the defendant’s malicious conduct caused a third party not to provide, or to delay in providing, specific desired financing on the particular property. It is true, as the majority points out, that the opinions in Belo and earlier Texas cases contain language indicating that the only allowable damages in such an action are for loss of a specific sale. In my opinion, however, the scope of those decisions should be limited to the facts and allegations presented to the courts in those eases. In future cases, this Court should allow recovery when the plaintiff can prove with reasonable certainty his pecuniary losses proximately caused by the lender’s refusal to provide the loan at the time the plaintiff was seeking it. For example, if a defendant maliciously clouded the plaintiff’s title on some real estate, causing a bank to delay the granting of a loan on that property, I would allow recovery for at least the losses attributable to the increase in the interest rate during the time the plaintiff was unable to get the loan.
The proof offered by Wilemon and Maho-ney in the trial of this case, however, is inadequate to support recovery, even under the approach advocated in this concurrence. No evidence was offered to show from whom the loan was supposedly sought, what interest rate the loan would have carried, and what specific financial harm was suffered as a result of the inability to get the desired loan at the time it was sought. The evidence shows only that Wil-emon and Mahoney continued to pay interest and taxes on loan money they had already received. Since they would have been obligated to make those payments regardless of Ellis’s acts, Ellis should not be held responsible for expenses associated with those earlier loans.
I therefore concur in the judgment of the Court.
KILGARLIN, J., joins in this concurring opinion.