Court Opinion

ID: 9623906
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:45:45.961755+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:36.420316
License: Public Domain

Banke, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent.
The tax lien in question was predicated on taxes owed by the husband of the co-tenant with whom the appellee had owned the property, and it is apparent without dispute from the record that the appellee had no knowledge of its existence at the time she and her co-tenant sold the property to Wooster. The majority nevertheless holds that the appellant, which was retained by the title insurance company for Fulton Federal Savings & Loan Association to examine the title to the property prior to the closing, has a claim against the appellee for its own oversight in failing to discover the lien. The majority reaches this result by way of its conclusion that Fulton Federal was entitled under OCGA § 44-5-60 (a) to the full benefit of the unrestricted warranty of title contained in the warranty deed which Wooster received *894from the appellee, even though the security deed which it received from Wooster specified that its title was “subject to encumbrances of record.”
Decided July 31, 1991
Reconsideration denied September 3, 1991
Gort, Hassett, Cohen & Beitchman, Robert W. Hassett, for appellant.
Robert J. Hippie, for appellee.
If the court’s interpretation of OCGA § 44-5-60 (a) is correct, then the appellee would be equally liable to Fulton Federal and its assigns for the amount of tax lien even if the latter’s security deed had specifically referenced the lien and stated that the conveyance was being made subject to it. Believing that such an interpretation of the statute cannot be squared with common sense and further believing that it leads to a manifestly unjust result when applied to the facts of this case, I would affirm the judgment of the trial court.