In unlawful detainer cases by virtue of the termination of the right to possess under a contract of lease, the evidence needed to establish a cause of action is the lease contract and the violation of that lease by the lessee. This is illustrated in this case of Letty against the spouses Lauro and Leonor.
The lots involved in this case were lots 4-B and 4-C titled in the name of Fidela, the mother of Letty. Occupying said lots were several lessees particularly the spouses Roy and Glo, and Lauro and Leonor. On March 8, 1982, Fidela executed a Conditional Deed of Sale selling said lots to the spouses Roy and Glo. Thereafter the lots were then cleared of other lessees including the spouses Lauro and Leonor. But when Roy and Glo offered to pay the agreed price and Fidela refused, the spouses Roy and Glo filed an action for specific performance against Fidela. During the pendency of the case a notice of lis pendens was annotated at the back of Fidela’s TCTs upon the instance of Roy and Glo.
After trial, the RTC ruled in favor of the spouses and ordered Fidela to execute a document in due form conveying the lots to them while they were likewise ordered to deliver the balance of the purchase price in the sum of P330,000.
Fidela however appealed the said RTC decision to the Court of Appeals (CA). But sometime in 1994, during the pendency of her appeal, Fidela donated both her properties to her daughters, Lot 4-B to Letty and Lot 4-C to Vilma.
The RTC decision was affirmed by the CA with modification and later on by the Supreme Court (SC) which found no reversible error in the CA decision. Hence the CA decision affirming the RTC decision with modification became final and executory on March 29, 1996. Thereafter, the spouses Lauro and Leonor who were also original lessees of the subject properties negotiated with the spouse Roy and Glo for the lease of lots 4-B and 4-C for P10,000 a month. Hence starting December 1996, the spouses Lauro and Leonor paid rentals to spouses Roy and Glo.
Meantime in 1997, Vilma donated lot 4-C to her sister Letty thereby making the latter the registered owner of both lots. Then on June 29, 1999, before the RTC decision affirmed by the CA and the SC could be executed and before the spouses Roy and Glo could pay the balance of P330,000, Letty wrote the spouses Lauro and Leonor requiring payment of rentals over the lots at the increased rate of P25,000, otherwise they must vacate the properties. When the spouses Lauro and Leonor ignored the letter, Letty filed a complaint for unlawful detainer against them before the Municipal Trial Court. According to Letty, although the RTC decision affirmed by the CA and SC was already final, ownership has not yet been transferred to the spouses Roy and Glo because Fidela had not yet executed the document conveying the property nor has she delivered the title, while the spouses had not yet paid the balance. Hence being still the registered owner, Letty said she was entitled to the payment of rentals leased to the spouses Lauro and Leonor. Considering that the latter failed to pay the rent to her, Letty contended that she was entitled to eject them. Was Letty correct?
No. In unlawful detainer cases due to violation of a lease contract, two requisites must concur: (1) failure to pay the rent or comply with the conditions of the lease, and (2) demand both to pay or to comply and vacate. The first requisite refers to the existence of a cause of action, while the second refers to the jurisdictional requirement in order that cause of action may be pursued. Implied in the first requisite is proof of the lease by presentation in evidence of the lease contract between plaintiff and defendant.
In this case, no contract of lease existed between Letty and the spouses Lauro and Leonor much less that the spouses violated the terms thereof. Letty likewise failed to prove her right to possess the subject property incumbent upon her since the very issue in unlawful detainer case is who between plaintiff and defendant has a better right to possess the property in question.
Letty’s right to possess the property supposedly arose from the donations of the same from her mother Fidela and sister Vilma. However these donations are highly dubious and questionable because they were made even after the findings by the RTC, CA and the SC that said properties should already be delivered to the spouses Roy and Glo. Although the rulings of the court were not yet final or executed during the dates of donations, the more prudent course of action especially for the party against whom the judgment was rendered would have been to suspend all transactions regarding the properties; at least until the issues regarding their supposed sale to the spouses Roy and Glo were settled.
Furthermore the notice of lis pendens on the TCTs shows that Letty was aware that the properties donated were still subject of litigation and that she was bound by the outcome of said litigation. Hence, far from being absolute, her title to the properties by virtue of the donations was tenuous and conditional on the reversal of the decision adverse to her mother and predecessor-in-interest. Thus the donations in her favor and the TCTs issued in her name during the pendency of the litigation could not serve to evade the ensuing final decision (Fideldia vs. Spouses Mulato, G.R. 149189, September 3, 2008).
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