SALE OF A BUSH SECTION

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 392, 18 May 1910, Page 2

SALE OF A BUSH SECTION

!' WHO BROUGHT IT ABOUT? In the Magistrate's Court yesterday Mr. L. G. Reid, S.M., was called wpon to define the duties of a land agent. As a general iprinciple Mr. C. W. Govett, appearing for the plaintiffs in the case of Gilmour and Clarke v. Schmidt and Belshaw, laid down that if a land agent, having authority to sell a property, sent an enquirer to look at it and a &ale resulted, the agent was entitled to receive a commission for 'bringing about the sale, Mr. Geo. Grey, for the defendants, contended that it was the business and the duty of the land agent to actually 'bring afoout the sale, to effect a binding agreement between the parties. Otherwise, he pointed out, there was nothing to prevent agents claiming for services rendered by merely placing a placard of the particulars of the property on a card in the office window. The Magistrate took time to consider the law on the point, of which counsel quoted quite a lot, and also to arrive at a correct understanding of the facts, evidence concerning which was just as contradictory as is usual in eases of this description . The claim was for £l7 10s, commission on the sale of the farm of the defendants, alleged foy plaintiffs to have foeen effected by their agency or instrumentality. The farm is at Okau, forty-eight' miles from New Plymouth, and the purchaser was Willie Greenwood. He first ..heard of the property from one McKenzie, his forother-in-law, of Waitara, stablekeeper. McKenzie took him to see T. W. Welch, a New Plymouth land agent, and he in turn took him to Gilmour and Clarke, who gave him full particulars of the property. The property changed hands in April, but the deal was not completed till the following January, i'laintiffs then wrote to defendants, stating they had just learned from Greenwood that they were instrumental in effecting the i sale, and claiming commission. They had not given Greenwood a letter of introduction to the vendors, or notified them of his coming. Greenwood, in the box, stated that when he went to the farm he told the defendants, in answer to their question, that he ifoad been sent out by the three agents previously men- j i tioned, and that he had told them he ! considered Gilmour and Clarke entitled! U> receive the commission. He denied fli-H his evidence was colored by the jact that re had had a disagreement with •'■v cerVndants, and that the success of thi« action would assist him in a case which lie himself was -bringing against ! them. j The defendants denied .all .knowledge , of the agents having anything to do with I the deal, relying on the fact that tney ■ had received no communication to that j effect until ten months after the deal 1 was effected and that Greenwood told I them that he had come out "on his | own," without any direction from any I agent, merely as the result of a conversation with McKenzie, with whom he Resided. When the sale was decided , upon the parties came to New Plymouth, I but did not go near the plaintiffs. They | went to Messrs. Roy and Nicholson's nffipo an/1 iHio../. V.J,„ j

, office, and there the agreement was j drawn up and signed. He admitted no • liability, on the ground that the defend- | ants 'had not, to his knowledge, 'brought | about the sale. A considerable quantity of evidence was heard, and the case occupied some -hours. It transpired that I other claims for commission were foein« made in respect of this same transact ■ tion. j Judgment was reserved. I -■