673 Davis v. Mueller, 528 S.W,.3d 97 (Tex. 2017)
Wednesday, August 1st, 2018
The following is not a legal opinion. You should consult your attorney if the case may be of significance to you.
Davis v. Mueller, 528 S.W,.3d 97 (Tex. 2017), held that a conveyance of all interests owned by grantor in Harrison County satisfied the Statute of Frauds. The parties aligned as successors to Grantor and Grantee under a 1991 deed. Grantor conveyed mineral interests in vaguely described tracts in Harrison County, Texas which did not satisfy the Statute of Frauds. The list of tracts was followed by this sentence: “Grantor agrees to execute any supplemental instrument requested by Grantee for a more complete or accurate description of said land” (“further assurances provision”). This was followed by a paragraph containing a Mother Hubbard clause and the following “general granting clause”: “Grantor hereby conveys to Grantee all of the mineral, royalty, and overriding royalty interest owned by Grantor in Harrison County, whether or not same is herein above correctly described.”
Grantor sought to avoid the effect of the 1991 deed and asserted that the deed was insufficient to satisfy the requirement of the Statute of Frauds that property conveyed be identified with reasonable certainty. Grantee argued that the general granting clause was sufficient to pass title of all of Grantor’s mineral interests in Harrison County.
“While the Statute of Frauds requires only that certain promises or agreements be in writing and signed by the person to be charged, as applied to real-estate conveyances, ‘the writing must furnish within itself, or by reference to some other existing writing, the means or data by which the land to be conveyed may be identified with reasonable certainty.’” “But Texas law has also long regarded general granting clauses as valid and effective, a proposition . . . [Grantor did not dispute].” In J. Hiram Moore, Ltd. v. Greer, the court did not follow this general rule, because in Greer the grantor conveyed all that she owned in a tract, which she did not own, followed by a recital that she intended to convey all that she owned in Wharton County. The Greer court held that was ambiguous.
In this case, Grantor argued that the 1991 deed was ambiguous because the general granting clause is in the same paragraph as the Mother Hubbard clause. Grantor contended that the proximity shows that the general grant was only of all small pieces of the specifically described tracts in Harrison County, not of other tracts. The court rejected Grantor’s argument, noting the following:
. . . if that were true, the general grant would accomplish nothing; the Mother Hubbard clause itself covers small pieces that may have been overlooked or incorrectly described. The general grant’s conveyance of “all of the mineral, royalty, and overriding royalty interest owned by Grantor in Harrison County, whether or not same is herein above correctly described” could not be clearer. All means all.
Additionally, Grantor argued that Grantor’s “express agreement ‘to execute any supplemental instrument requested by Grantee for a more complete or accurate description of said land’ shows that the parties contemplated that any other tracts would be covered by separate instruments, which would not be necessary if the general grant covered them.” The court noted that such an agreement “is consistent with the general grant. It simply provides that if supplemental instruments are required to carry out the specific and general grants, the grantor will supply them.”
The court held that the general grant in the 1991 deed was valid and unambiguous, conveying Grantor’s title to Harrison County mineral interests to Grantee.
The case follows precedent by enforcing a general granting clause and further distinguishes the Greer case as an outlier. It also establishes that a further assurances clause will not have the effect of making an otherwise certain grant uncertain.