Springette v Defoe (1992) 2 FLR 388
This case shows that in the absence of evidence to the contrary, for example a communicated intention to hold the property in equal shares, the property was held on a resulting trust for the persons who provided the purchase money in the proportions in which they provided it.
In the case itself, property was purchased in joint names. The couple had lived together for a short time as joint tenants of the local authority but they were able to purchase at a substantial discount from the estimated market value because Miss Springette had been a tenant of the local authority for more than eleven years.
The property was purchased with the assistance of a building society mortgage – for the repayment of which they were both liable as covenantors. Treating the mortgage monies as provided in equal shares – and giving Miss Springette credit for the whole of the tenant's discount - her contribution to the purchase was approx. 75%.
They agreed that they were each intended to have some beneficial interest in the property. It was found as a fact by the trial judge that they never had any discussion at all, at or before the time of the purchase, about what their respective interests were to be.
Held: The property was owned in equal shares because there was sufficient evidence on the facts of inference of common intention or arrangement between the parties that the property should be owned in equal shares.
Dillon LJ: "In Walker v Hall I expressed the view at p 134C that it was not open to this court, in the absence of specific evidence of the parties' intentions, to hold that the property there in question belonged beneficially to the parties in equal shares, notwithstanding their unequal contributions to the purchase price, simply because it was bought to be their family home and they intended – or possibly one should say 'hoped' – that their relationship should last for life. The effect is that, in the absence of an express declaration of the beneficial interests, the court will hold that the joint purchasers hold the property on a resulting trust for themselves in the proportions in which they contributed directly or indirectly to the purchase price, unless there is sufficient specific evidence of their common intention that they should be entitled in other proportions – eg in equal shares notwithstanding unequal contributions – to rebut the presumption of resulting trust.
The common intention must be founded on evidence such as would support a finding that there is an implied or constructive trust for the parties in proportions to the purchase price. The court does not as yet sit, as under a palm tree, to exercise a general discretion to do what the man in the street, on a general overview of the case, might regard as fair... but the common intention of the parties must, in my judgment, mean a shared intention communicated between them. It cannot mean an intention which each happened to have in his or her own mind but had never communicated to the other." and "Since, therefore, it is clear in the present case that there never was any discussion between the parties about what their respective beneficial interests were to be, they cannot, in my judgment, have had in any relevant sense any common intention as to the beneficial ownership of the property... the presumption of resulting trust is not displaced."
Steyn LJ: "Given that no actual common intention to share the property in equal beneficial shares was established, one is driven back to the equitable principle that the shares are to be presumed to be in proportion to the contributions."
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