Law Notes Property, Equity and Trusts 1 Notes
The old Property, Equity & Trusts subject at UNSW. Dealt primarily with old system. Contents include detailed case notes (and super summaries ideal for use in an open book exam) and article summaries on the following classes:
Class 1&2 – The Concept of Property
Class 3&4 - Goods
Class 5&6 - Possession of Land
Class 7 - Limitation of Actions
Class 8 - The Doctrine of Tenure and Estates; Determinable and Conditional and Future Interests, The Doctrine of Waste, Fragmentation of legal/beneficial...
The following is a more accessible plain text extract of the PDF sample above, taken from our Property, Equity and Trusts 1 Notes. Due to the challenges of extracting text from PDFs, it will have odd formatting:
Often one may acquire an equitable interest in the property of another even where the result wasn’t intended – e.g. where the donor has done ‘everything necessary to be done’ to effectuate a gift. In such situation the interest arises under a constructive trust.
Other circumstances in which a constructive trust may be imposed include to prevent a person with a legal interest in land from behaving unconscionably – e.g. in informal family arrangements or where a holder of a legal interest purports to transfer an interest in property in return for contributions made by the other party
Alternative to Lord Denning’s view in Hine v Hine was that constructive trusts could be imposed independent of the parties’ intention, whenever it was necessary to achieve a distribution of property between spouses or de facto couples
The court of appeal in Burns v Burns resiled from this approach – courts don’t have power to do what is fair and reasonable in all the circumstances – ‘the resolution of these disputes must depend on the ascertainment according to normal principles of the respective property rights between the man and woman’
But in Oglivie v Ryan the judgement of Lord Diplock in Gissing v Gissing was found to provide the basis for the imposition of a constructive trust based on the ‘common intention’ of the parties
Oglivie v Ryan (1976) 2 NSWLR 504 Facts: Oglivie was the MD of a company that owned a theatre and cottages. After his wife’s death in 1955 he lived with Mrs Ryan – their relationship being ‘very close terms of friendship and affection’ with her looking after him ‘as any devoted wife might have done’. In 1969 the company sold the theatre and cottages and O told R she would have to leave and she said she would try to find another house. O proposed he buy a house and she live with him to look after him for the rest of his life. R gave evidence that O told her that if she looked after him the house would be hers so long as she lived and that she agreed to these terms. O bought the house and R lived there with him till his death in ’72. O’s will didn’t mention her – O’s executor commenced proceedings to recover possession. Holland J: In his judgement his honour referred to a number of cases: Bannister v Bannister – plaintiff orally agrees to sell house she lives in to defendant for price lower than market value if she was permitted to live there rent free.
Binions v Evans – where A&B had an agreement for B to live in A’s cottage for life rent free on certain conditions and A sell the cottage to C on terms subject to A’s agreement with B and C attempts to get rid of B by applying for an order of possession on the ground that B only had a tenancy at will with C terminated – a constructive trust for B arose on sale from A to C since it would be inequitable for C to turn B out. Hussey v Palmer – plaintiff pays for extension to defendant’s home on promise by defendant she could live there as long as she liked. She left, later claiming to be entitled to recover the amount she had paid as her loan.
Eves v Eves – unmarried couple with child agreed that dilapidated house should be purchased to serve as a joint home for them. Father bought house in his own name with his money saying he couldn’t put it in her name since she was underage. She did a lot of physical work on the land (setting up a garden etc.). He deserts her and puts her out.
Denning, referring to Diplock in Gissing – A constructive/implied/resulting trust arises where a trustee conducts themselves such that it’d be inequitable to allow him to deny the cestui que trust a beneficial interest in the land; he will be held to have conducted himself as such if by words or conduct he induced the cestui que trust to act to his own benefit in the reasonable belief that by acting so he was acquiring a beneficial interest to land Last v Rosenfield – A agreed to sell and transfer to B half his interest in a house owned for the price that he originally paid for it on an oral agreement that if B didn’t live in it within 12 months he would retransfer it to A at the same price. B failed to perform but when A sought to enforce the title, B relied on the Statute of Frauds to say it was unenforceable Held: A trust arose from the basis on which the property required. The Statute can’t be used since it would be used as an instrument of fraud and hence parol evidence is admissible to establish that the transfer of property was done as a trustee for another party. From these cases his honour identified 2 categories of case:
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Buy the full version of these notes or essay plans and more in our Property, Equity and Trusts 1 Notes.
The old Property, Equity & Trusts subject at UNSW. Dealt primarily with old system. Contents include detailed case notes (and super summaries ideal for use in an open book exam) and article summaries on the following classes:
Class 1&2 – The Concept of Property
Class 3&4 - Goods
Class 5&6 - Possession of Land
Class 7 - Limitation of Actions
Class 8 - The Doctrine of Tenure and Estates; Determinable and Conditional and Future Interests, The Doctrine of Waste, Fragmentation of legal/beneficial...
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