Court Opinion

ID: 9661783
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:49:38.339237+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:33.498573
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing
The appellant has filed a motion for rehearing in which it contends, among other things, that this Court erred in sustaining the trial court’s ruling in excluding evidence of the quitclaim deed from Mrs. Mat-lage’s estate. It is argued that such proof *811was admissible in mitigation of the plaintiffs’ damages.
The record shows that after the discovery of the defect in their title the plaintiffs called on the defendant to cure such defect. On October 13, 1965, the defendant wrote to the plaintiffs a letter denying that it had “any further duty regarding this title.” The Prendergasts filed their suit on November 30, 1965. The case was tried by the plaintiffs on the theory that they were entitled to damages for breach of the defendant’s contract of guaranty. The defendant defended on the theory that the plaintiffs were not entitled to such recovery. It was not until that had been done that the defendant, about seven years after the date of the contract and almost six years after request was made of it that it cure the defect, procured the execution of the quitclaim deed which it offered to prove.
It may well be that the defendant was entitled to a reasonable opportunity to cure the defect in the title before the plaintiffs were entitled to maintain their suit for damages. That question is not before this Court because the defendant here was given such an opportunity and declined to accept “any further duty” in the matter. Their procurement of the quitclaim deed under the facts of this case, as a matter of law, was not a reasonable exercise of any right to cure the defect as an alternative to their duty to pay damages for their breach of the contract of guaranty. The defendant by its refusal to accept the reasonable opportunity to cure the defect has compelled the plaintiffs to seek other relief under the contract. After the plaintiffs, under such compulsion, have sued for their damages the defendant cannot defeat their claim by such a belated effort to cure the defect.
Appellant’s motion for rehearing overruled.