California Court of Appeal

Dismissal of plaintiff's complaint seeking to recover the deposit it delivered to defendant for the purchase of a mobile home park is reversed and remanded, where: 1) plaintiff should be given the opportunity to amend its complaint to allege its reasonable interpretation of the purchase agreement and facts showing that defendant failed or refused to close in some manner other than by materially breaching the agreement by not tendering the deed; 2) defendant's failure to perform its promise to transfer the deed resulted in a total failure of consideration and supports a claim for money had and received; 3) plaintiff adequately alleged a reasonable interpretation of the purchase agreement under which section 1.2 is void to the extent it permits defendant to retain the deposit when defendant has not breached, and that defendant has been unjustly enriched by retaining the deposit; but 4) because plaintiff cannot allege that it owned or possessed the deposit at the time of the alleged conversion, it cannot state a conversion claim; and 5) plaintiff failed to state a claim for fraud.

Appellate Information

• Decided 01/23/2014
• Published 01/23/2014

Judges

• PREMO

Court

• California Court of Appeal

Counsel