G.R. No.

147468

April 9, 2003

SPOUSES EDUARDO ARENAS DOMINGO & JOSEFINA

CHAVEZ DOMINGO, petitioners,
vs.
LILIA MONTINOLA ROCES, CESAR ROBERTO M. ROCES,
ANA INES MAGDALENA ROCES TOLENTINO, LUIS MIGUEL
M. ROCES, JOSE ANTONIO M. ROCES and MARIA VIDA
PRESENTACION ROCES, respondents.

RTC: Montinola is liable for damages; Petitioners counter-claim

was dismissed
CA: Affidavit of Self-Adjudication was declared null and void;
Transfer Certificate of Title No. 57218 (11664), under the names of
Sps Roces was reinstated.
ISSUE: WHETHER SEC. 4, RULE 74 IS AN ENCUMBRANCE
WHICH DISQUALIFIES PETITIONERS FROM BEING
INNOCENT PURCHASERS FOR VALUE;

YNARES-SANTIAGO, J.:
FACTS: Spouses Cesar and Lilia Roces were the owners of two
contiguous parcels of land located on Arayat Street, Mandaluyong,
covered by Transfer Certificates of Title Nos. 57217 and 57218.
On November 13, 1962, the GSIS caused the annotation of an
affidavit of adverse claim on the titles alleging that the spouses
have mortgaged the same to it. Subsequently, GSIS wrote a letter
to Cesar Roces demanding the surrender of the owner's
duplicates of titles. When Roces failed to comply, GSIS filed a
petition with the CFI praying that the owner's duplicates in Roces'
possession be declared null and void and that the ROD be
directed to issue new owner's duplicates to GSIS. The CFI granted
the petition and TCT Nos. 57217 (11663) and 57218 (11664) were
issued in the name of GSIS.
Cesar Roces died intestate on January 26, 1980. He was survived
by his widow, Lilia, and their children: Cesar, Ana, Luis Miguel M.
Roces, Jose Antonio and Maria Vida, all of whom are the
respondents in this case.
On July 22, 1992, Reynaldo L. Montinola, a nephew of Lilia
Roces, executed an affidavit of self-adjudication over the Arayat
properties. He alleged that the properties were owned by the
spouses Roces, both of whom died intestate, on September 13,
1987 and June 27, 1989, respectively; that the spouses left no
heirs except the brother of Lilia Roces, who was his father; that
neither of the spouses left any will nor any debts; and that he was
the sole heir of the Roces spouses. Montinola succeeded in
annulling the titles and was issued TCT No. 7299 in the name of
Montinola in lieu of TCT No. 57218 (11664). Montinola later sold
the property covered by TCT No. 7299 in favor of petitioner
spouses Eduardo and Josefina Domingo. Thereafter, TCT No.
7673 was issued in the names of petitioners.
Both TCT Nos. 7299 and 7673 was subject to the provision of
Section 4, Rule 74 of the Rules of Court.
Respondents learned of the sale of the prop erty to petitioners,
they filed a complaint against Montinola and petitioners with the
RTC. They argued that the affidavit of self-adjudication was
fraudulent because Montinola was not an heir of the Roces
spouses and it was not true that Lilia Roces was dead. Therefore,
the affidavit of self-adjudication, as well as the deed of absolute
sale, TCT No. 7299, and TCT No. 7673, all covering the subject
property, were null and void.
In their answer, petitioners alleged that they were buyers in good
faith and that their action was barred by estoppel and laches.

WHETHER RESPONDENTS WERE GUILTY OF

LACHES
HELD:
The buyer of real property the title of which contain an annotation
pursuant to Rule 74, Section 4 of the Rules of Court cannot be
considered innocent purchasers for value. In the same vein,
the annotation at the back of TCT No. 7299 in this case referring
to Rule 74, Section 4 of the Rules of Court was sufficient notice to
petitioners of the limitation on Montinola's right to dispose of the
property. The presence of an irregularity which excites or arouses
suspicion should prompt the vendee to look beyond the certificate
and investigate the title of the vendor appearing on the face
thereof. Purchasers of registered land are bound by the
annotations found at the back of the certificate of title.
Hence, petitioners cannot be considered buyers in good faith and
cannot now avoid the consequences brought about by the
application of Rule 74, Section 4 of the Rules of Court.
Laches is the failure or neglect, for an unreasonable and
unexplained length of time, to do that which, by exercising due
diligence, could or should have been done earlier. The essential
elements of laches are: (1) conduct on the part of defendant or
one under whom he claims, giving rise to the situation complained
of; (2) delay in asserting complainant's right after he had
knowledge of the defendant's conduct and after he has an
opportunity to sue; (3) lack of knowledge or notice on the part of
the defendant that the complainant would assert the right on which
he bases his suit; and (4) injury or prejudice to the defendant in
the event relief is accorded to the complainant.
On the other hand, estoppel by laches arises from the
negligence or omission to assert a right within a reasonable time,
warranting a presumption that the party entitled to assert it either
has abandoned it or declined to assert it.
In the case at bar, only four months elapsed from the time
respondents discovered Montinola's fraudulent acts, sometime in
May 1993, to the time they filed their complaint on September 6,
1993. This relatively short span of time can hardly be called
unreasonable, especially considering that respondents used this
period of time to investigate the transfers of the property. Delay is
an indispensable requisite for a finding of estoppel by laches, but
to be barred from bringing suit on grounds of estoppel and laches,
the delay must be lengthy and unreasonable. No unreasonable
delay can be attributed to respondents in this case.

G.R. No. 45904

September 30, 1938

Intestate estate of the deceased Luz Garcia. PABLO G.

UTULO, applicant-appellee,
vs.
LEONA PASION VIUDA DE GARCIA, oppositor-appellant.
IMPERIAL, J.:
FACTS:
This is an appeal taken by the oppositor from the order of
the Court of First Instance of the Province of Tarlac appointing the
applicant as judicial administrator of the property left by the
deceased Luz Garcia.
Juan Garcia Sanchez died intestate, and in the
proceedings instituted in the CFI for the administration of his
property (special proceedings No. 3475), Leona Pasion Vda. de
Garcia, the surviving spouse and the herein oppositor, was
appointed judicial administratrix. The said deceased left legitimate
children, named Juan, jr., Patrocinio and Luz who, with the widow,
are the presumptive forced heirs. Luz Garcia married the applicant
Pablo G. Utulo and during the pendency of the administration
proceedings of the said deceased, she died in the province
without any legitimate descendants, her only forced heirs being
her mother and her husband. The latter commenced in the same
court the judicial administration of the property of his deceased
wife (special proceedings No. 4188), stating in his petition that her
only heirs were he himself and his mother-in-law, the oppositor,
and that the only property left by the deceased consisted in the
share due her from the intestate of her father, Juan Garcia
Sanchez, and asking that he be named administrator of the
property of said deceased. The oppositor objected to the petition,
opposing the judicial administration of the property of her daughter
and the appointment of the applicant as administrator. She alleged
that inasmuch as the said deceased left no indebtedness, there
was no occasion for the said judicial administration; but she stated
that should the court grant the administration of the property, she
should be appointed the administratrix thereof inasmuch as she
had a better right than the applicant. After the required
publications, trial court finally issued the appealed order to which
the oppositor excepted and thereafter filed the record on appeal
which was certified and approved.
ISSUED:

WHO AMONG THE APPLICANT AND THE

OPPOSITOR HAS A BETTER RIGHT TO BE
APPOINTED ADMINISTRATOR TO THE
ESTATE OF LUZ GARCIA.

absence of debts existing against the estate, the heirs may

enter upon the administration of the said property
immediately. If they desire to administer it jointly, they may do so.
If they desire to partition it among themselves and can do this by
mutual agreement, they also have that privilege.
The Code of Procedure in Civil Actions provides how an
estate may be divided by a petition for partition in case they
cannot mutually agree in the division. When there are no debts
existing against the estate, there is certainly no occasion for
the intervention of an administrator in the settlement and
partition of the estate among the heirs. When the heirs are all
of lawful age and there are no debts, there is no reason why the
estate should be burdened with the costs and expenses of an
administrator. The property belonging absolutely to the heirs, in
the absence of existing debts against the estate, the
administrator has no right to intervene in any way whatever in
the division of the estate among the heirs. They are co-owners
of an undivided estate and the law offers them a remedy for the
division of the same among themselves.
We conceive of no powerful reason which counsels the
abandonment of a doctrine so uniformly applied. We are
convinced that if the courts had followed it in all cases to which it
has application, their files would not have been replete with
unnecessary administration proceedings as they are now. There
is no weight in the argument adduced by the appellee to the
effect that his appointment as judicial administrator is
necessary so that he may have legal capacity to appear in the
intestate of the deceased Juan Garcia Sanchez. As he would
appear in the said intestate by the right of the representation, it
would suffice for him to allege in proof of his interest that he is a
usufructuary forced heir of his deceased wife who, in turn, would
be a forced heir and an interested and necessary party if she were
living. In order to intervene in said intestate and to take part in
the distribution of the property it is not necessary that the
administration of the property of his deceased wife be
instituted an administration which will take up time and
occasion inconvenience and unnecessary expenses.
In view of the foregoing, there is no need to
determine which of the parties has preferential right to the
office of administrator.

G.R. No. L-10474

February 28, 1958

BENNY SAMPILO and HONORATO SALACUP, petitioners,

vs.
THE COURT OF APPEALS and FELISA SINOPERA respondent.

HELD:
Under the provisions of the Civil Code (arts. 657 to 661),
the rights to the succession of a person are transmitted from the
moment of his death; in other words, the heirs succeeded
immediately to all of the property of the deceased ancestor. The
property belongs to the heirs at the moment of the death of the
ancestor as completely as if the ancestor had executed and
delivered to them a deed for the same before his death. In the

Clodualdo P. Surio for petitioners.

Moises B. Ramos for respondents.
LABRADOR, J.:
FACTS: Teodoro Tolete died intestate in January, 1945. He left 4
parcels of land, lots Nos. 12006, 119967, 14352 and 12176 .He

left as heirs his widow, Leoncia de Leon, and several nephews

and nieces, children of deceased brothers and sisters. On July 25,
1946, without any judicial proceedings, his widow executed an
affidavit stating that "the deceased Teodoro Tolete left no children
or respondent neither ascendants or acknowledged natural
children neither brother, sisters, nephews or nieces, but the,
widow Leoncia de Leon, the legitimate wife of the deceased, the
one and only person to inherit the above properties"
This affidavit was registered in the ROD of Pangasinan. On the
same day, she executed a deed of sale of all the above parcels of
land in favor of Benny Sampilo for the sum of P10,000. This sale
was also registered in the ROD. On June 17, 1950, Benny
Sampilo, in turn, sold the said parcels of land to Honorato Salacup
for P50,000 and this sale was also registered in ROD.
In March, 1950, Felisa Sinopera instituted proceedings for the
administration of the estate of Teodoro Tolete, and having secured
her appointment as administratrix, brought the present action on
June 20, 1950. Notice of lis pendens was filed in the Office of the
Register of Deeds and said notice was recorded on certificates of
title covering the said properties on June 26, 1950. This notice,
however, was subsequent to the registration of the deed of sale, in
favor of Honorato Salacup, which took place on June 17, 1950.
The complaint alleges that the widow Leoncia de Leon, had no
right to execute the affidavit of adjudication and that Honorato
Salacup acquired no rights to the lands sold to him, and that
neither had Benny Sampilo acquired any right to the said
properties. Sampilo and Salacup filed an answer alleging that the
complaint states no cause of action; that if such a cause exists the
same is barred by the statute of limitations (Sec. 4 Rule 74); that
defendants are innocent purchasers for value
RTC: declared that the affidavit of adjudication and both the deeds
of sale are all null and void
CA: Annulled the affidavit of adjudication; it modified the judgment,
declaring that the deeds of sale"are null and void only insofar as
the properties thereby conveyed exceed the portion that the
responds to Leoncia de Leon.

ISSUE: WHETHER FELISA SINOPERA'S RIGHT OF ACTION

TO
RECOVER
HER
AND
HER
CO-HEIRS'
PARTICIPATION TO THE LANDS IN QUESTION HAD
NOT PRESCRIBED AT THE TIME THE ACTION TO
RECOVER WAS FILED.
HELD: The procedure outlined in Section 1 of Rule 74 of
extrajudicial settlement, or by affidavit, is an ex parte proceeding.
It cannot by any reason or logic be contended that such
settlement or distribution would affect third persons who had
no knowledge either of the death of the decedent or of the
extrajudicial settlement or affidavit, especially as no mention
of such effect is made, either directly or by implication.
We are of the opinion and so hold that the provisions of
Section 4 of Rule 74, barring distributees or heirs from
objecting to an extrajudicial partition after the expiration of

two years from such extrajudicial partition, is applicable only

(1) to persons who have participated or taken part or had
notice of the extrajudicial partition, and, in addition, (2) when
the provisions of Section 1 of Rule 74 have been strictly
complied with, i.e., that all the persons or heirs of the
decedent have taken part in the extrajudicial settlement or are
represented by themselves or through guardians. The case at
bar fails to comply with both requirements because not all the
heirs interested have participated in the extrajudicial settlement,
the Court of Appeals having found that the decedent left aside
from his widow, nephews and nieces living at the time of his death.
The next contention of appellants is that plaintiff's action is barred
by the statute of limitations. The origin of the Provision (Section 4,
Rule 74), upon which this contention is predicated, which is
Section 596 of Act No. 190, fails to support the contention. In the
first Place, there is nothing therein, or in its source which shows
clearly a statute of limitations and a bar of action against third
person's. It is only a bar against the parties who had taken
part in the extrajudicial proceedings but not against third
persons not Parties thereto. In the second place, the statute of
limitations is contained in a different chapter of Act No. 190,
Chapter XL, and if Section 596 of the Act had been meant to be a
statute of limitations, it would naturally have been included in the
chapter which defines the statute.
But even if Section 4 of Rule 74 is a statute of limitations, it is still
unavailing to the defendants. The action is one based on fraud,
as the widow of the deceased owner of the lands had declared in
her affidavit of partition that the deceased left no nephews or
niece, or other heirs except herself. Plaintiff's right which is
based on fraud and which has a period of four years (Section
43, par. 3, Act no. 190; Article 1146, Civil Code), does not appear
to have lapsed the action was instituted. Judicial proceedings
where instituted in March, 1950 and these proceedings must have
been instituted soon after the discovery of fraud. In any case, the
defendants have the burden of proof as to their claim of the statute
of limitations, which is their defense, and they have not proved
that when the action was instituted, four years had already
elapsed from the date that the interested parties had actual
knowledge of the fraud.

G.R. No. 156536

October 31, 2006

JOSEPH CUA, petitioner,

vs.
GLORIA A. VARGAS, AURORA VARGAS, RAMON VARGAS,
MARITES VARGAS, EDELINA VARGAS AND GEMMA
VARGAS, respondents.
AZCUNA, J.:
FACTS: A parcel of residential land with an area of 99 square
meters located in San Juan, Virac, Catanduanes was left behind
by the late Paulina Vargas. On February 4, 1994, a notarized
Extra Judicial Settlement Among Heirs was executed by and
among Paulina Vargas' heirs, namely Ester Vargas, Visitacion
Vargas, Juan Vargas, Zenaida V. Matienzo, Rosario V. Forteza,

Andres Vargas, Gloria Vargas, Antonina Vargas and Florentino

Vargas, partitioning and adjudicating unto themselves the lot in
question, each one of them getting a share of 11 square meters.
Florentino, Andres, Antonina and Gloria, however, did not sign the
document. Only Ester, Visitacion, Juan, Zenaida and Rosario
signed it. The Extra Judicial Settlement Among Heirs was
published for three consecutive weeks.
On November 15, 1994, an Extra Judicial Settlement Among Heirs
with Sale was again executed by and among the same heirs over
the same property and also with the same sharings. Once more,
only Ester, Visitacion, Juan, Zenaida and Rosario signed the
document and their respective shares totaling 55 square meters
were sold to Joseph Cua, petitioner herein.
According to Gloria Vargas, the widow of Santiago Vargas, she
came to know of the two Extra Judicial Settlements only when the
original house built on the lot was being demolished sometime in
May 1995. After knowing of the sale of the 55 square meters to
petitioner, Gloria Vargas tried to redeem the property but the offer
was refused, thus she filed a case for annulment of Extra Judicial
Settlement and Legal Redemption.
Respondents claimed that as co-owners of the property, they may
be subrogated to the rights of the purchaser by reimbursing him
the price of the sale. They likewise alleged that the 30-day period
following a written notice by the vendors to their co-owners for
them to exercise the right of redemption of the property had not
yet set in as no written notice was sent to them. In effect, they
claimed that the Extra Judicial Settlement Among Heirs and the
Extra Judicial Settlement Among Heirs with Sale were null and
void and had no legal and binding effect on them.
MTC rendered a decision in favor of petitioner, dismissing the
complaint. On appeal, the RTC affirmed the MTC decision. CA
reversed the ruling of both lower courts.

ISSUE:

WHETHER
HEIRS
ARE
DEEMED
CONSTRUCTIVELY NOTIFIED AND BOUND,
REGARDLESS OF THEIR FAILURE TO
PARTICIPATE
THEREIN,
BY
AN
EXTRAJUDICIAL
SETTLEMENT
AND

PARTITION
OF
ESTATE
WHEN THE
EXTRAJUDICIAL
SETTLEMENT
AND
PARTITION HAS BEEN DULY PUBLISHED
HELD:
The procedure outlined in Section 1 of Rule 74 is an ex
parte proceeding. The rule plainly states, however, that persons
who do not participate or had no notice of an extrajudicial
settlement will not be bound thereby. It contemplates a notice
that has been sent out or issued before any deed of
settlement and/or partition is agreed upon (i.e., a notice calling
all interested parties to participate in the said deed of extrajudicial
settlement and partition), and not after such an agreement has
already been executed as what happened in the instant case
with the publication of the first deed of extrajudicial
settlement among heirs.
The publication of the settlement does not constitute
constructive notice to the heirs who had no knowledge or did
not take part in it because the same was notice after the fact
of execution. The requirement of publication is geared for the
protection of creditors and was never intended to deprive heirs of
their lawful participation in the decedent's estate. In this
connection, the records of the present case confirm that
respondents never signed either of the settlement documents,
having discovered their existence only shortly before the filing of
the present complaint. Following Rule 74, these extrajudicial
settlements do not bind respondents, and the partition made
without their knowledge and consent is invalid insofar as they are
concerned.
AS TO THE 30-DAY NOTICE FOR REDEMPTION: It bears
emphasis that the period of one month shall be reckoned from the
time that a co-heir is notified in writing by the vendor of the actual
sale. Written notice is indispensable and mandatory, actual
knowledge of the sale acquired in some other manner by the
redemptioner notwithstanding. It cannot be counted from the time
advance notice is given of an impending or contemplated sale.
The law gives the co-heir thirty days from the time written notice of
the actual sale within which to make up his or her mind and decide
to repurchase or effect the redemption