Weber v. Merowitz

⁶⁷⁵ Sloan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from the Circuit Court of Baltimore City, ratifying a mortgagee’s report of sale, to which exceptions had been taken by the appellant. The appellant, Walter M. Weber, had purchased from Robert Seff a lot of ground fronting 84 feet 11 inches on the north side of West Street in the City of Baltimore for $16,000. Seff had purchased the property from Isaac Merowitz, the appellee, without taking a conveyance for the same in his own name, and a deed was thereafter made directly by Merowitz to Weber.

The lot was improved by seven dwelling houses, each of them subject to a ground rent of $18 a year. It appears that Merowitz was to- receive $14,000 for the property, so that the other $2,000 was to have gone to Seff. Seff and Weber gave Merowitz a mortgage for $10,000, on account of which $4,000 was paid, leaving a balance due, at the time of sale, of $6,000 on account of the principal, and six months’ interest, and taxes against the property amounting to about $2,000 had also accumulated. The sale, after three weeks.’ advertisement in the Daily Record, a daily newspaper published in Baltimore, was made on the premises-by William Lovitt, trustee, to the purchasers, David M. Schlossberg and wife, at $4,500.

It appears that, according to. the advertisement and report of sale, the seven houses and lots were offered separately and as a whole, the aggregate of the bids, on the separate parcels being $2,405. The grounds of exception were: First, because the property was sold at a grossly inadequate price and for so much less than its fair market value; second, because it was improperly, insufficiently, and illegally advertised; third, because the advertisement failed to> state that the parcel of land was subject to an original ground rent on a larger tract of land of which the mortgaged premises were a part, and the failure to state the exact amount, if any, of the original ground rent of said premises, thereby causing “vagueness, confusion, uncertainty and indefiniteness in the minds of prospective purchasers or bidders at the time of said sale and ⁶⁷⁶ preventing free, unrestrained and normal bidding at tbe time of sale.” The appellant produced one witness engaged in tbe real estate business, who testified that tbe mortgaged property ought to bring at private sale $6,350, which testimony was offset by tbe testimony of another real estate broker produced by tbe appellee, that be valued tbe property at $3,500, and that be attended the sale with tbe expectation of -buying if be could get it at a proper figure. Even on tbe appellant’s testimony, there is no such disparity between tbe estimated value and tbe price at which tbe property was sold as to lead one to infer that tbe inadequacy mounted up to- a fraud, or that tbe price was unfair. Tbe evidence is that tbe property was physically in bad shape and needed repairs, estimated at from three to four thousand dollars.

Most of the bouses were unoccupied. It has been frequently decided in this state that ■mere'inadequacy is no reason for setting aside a sale, unless tbe inadequacy is gross and there is prospect of a better price being obtained on a resale, and tbe circumstances indicate there was no real competition. Shirk v. Soper, 144 Md. 269 , 124 A. 911 ; Weinstein v. Boyd, 136 Md. 234 , 110 A. 506 ; Boyd v. Smith, 127 Md. 359 , 96 A. 526 ; Bank of Commerce v. Lanahan, 45 Md. 396 . Tbe appellant was present at the sale, which