LAW ON SALES | FUDOT VS. CATTLEYA LAND, INC., 533 SCRA 350, SEPTEMBER 13, 2007
FUDOT VS. CATTLEYA LAND, INC.,
533 SCRA 350, SEPTEMBER 13, 2007
TOPIC/DOCTRINE
Art. 1544 of the Civil Code, which provides the rule on
double sale, applies only to a situation where the same property is validly
sold to different vendees.
FACTS
Sometime in July 1992, Cattleya Land, Inc., after the
former finding no defect on the titles, purchased the nine lots from spouses
Troadio and Asuncion Tecson through a Deed of Absolute Sale. The Deed of
Conditional Sale and the Deed of Absolute Sale were registered with the
Register of Deeds on 06 November 1992 and 04 October 1993, respectively.
Titles to six (6) of the nine (9) lots were issued, but the
Register of Deeds refused to issue titles to the remaining three (3) lots,
because the titles covering the same were still unaccounted for.
On 23 January 1995, petitioner presented for registration
before the Register of Deeds the owner’s copy of the title of the subject
property, together with the deed of sale purportedly executed by the Tecsons in
favor of petitioner on 19 December 1986. On the following day, respondent sent
a letter of protest/opposition to petitioner’s application.
Asuncion filed a complaint-inintervention, claiming that
she never signed any deed of sale covering any part of their conjugal property
in favor of petitioner. She averred that her signature in petitioner’s deed of
sale was forged thus, said deed should be declared null and void. The trial
court concluded that the purported signature of Asuncion in the deed of sale in
favor of petitioner was forged, thereby rendering the sale void. The appellate
court dismissed her appeal.
ISSUE
Whether there is a valid sale in the instant case.
RULING
Negative.
The court held that the Civil Law provision on double sale
is not applicable where there is only one valid sale, the previous sale having
been found to be fraudulent. Likewise, in Espiritu and Apostol v. Valerio, 9
SCRA 761 (1963), where the same parcel of land was purportedly sold to two
different parties, the Court held that despite the fact that one deed of sale
was registered ahead of the other, Art. 1544 of the Civil Code will not apply
where said deed is found to be a forgery, the result of this being that the
right of the other vendee should prevail.