DISPUTE OVER HOTEL

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 610, 12 March 1929, Page 2

DISPUTE OVER HOTEL

TERMS OF SALE OF LEASE OWNER REFUSES POSSESSION (Special to THE SUN) HAMILTON. Monday. Eeeking the exact performance of an agreement for the sale of the lea% of Hotel Rotorua, a boarding house in Tutanekai Street, Gertrude Chenev Cheater, represented by Mr. L. Ro,‘ sued Mrs. Kmily Francis Ingram for £4OU, and asked that the agreement bf enforced. Mrs. Ingram was represented bv Mr. 11. T. Gillies. **

Plaintiff claimed that an agreement had been entered into o* December 17 1928, by which defendant contracted to sell the lease of the property for five years, with a right of renewal, for the sum of £1,400. Since then Mrs. Ingram had refused to give plaintiff possession according to the agreement, but had made an offer to lease the premises for five years at £7 a week.

Defendant denied that such an agreement existed, and said that if Staple and Johnson, her land agents, had signed on her behalf, they had dune so without her authority.

Hrnest Johnson, land agent, gave evidence for plaintiff that defendani had instructed him to sell the lease of her property. She was ill in bed at the time*, so he did not trouble to get the instruct %is iq writing, but she told him that the lease was for £7 a week for five years, with the right of renewal.

He had brought plaintiff and defendant together, and plaintiff had paid down £IOO as deposit. He drew up two copies of a sale note and gave on* to each party, but, when the plaintiff discovered that there was no provision for renewal of the lease she complained that she had been misled. She wa* willing to complete the deal but. in view of the reduced tenure, wanted a reduction of the purchase money. John Alfred Cheater, a clerk, of Rotorua, and son of the plaintiff, said ho had looked after his mother’s side of the transaction. He described th* negotiations that led up to the signing of the option, which was done ia the presence of Airs. Ingram. The two parties then retired to discuss the dispute in private, and later an adjournment was granted.