VENDOR AND PURCHASER. The law of Vendors and Purchasers of real estate in England is a subject of great extent, which may be said to coin. prise nearly the whole practical applica tion of the law of real property.
Contracts for the sale and purchase of land or other real estate may be entered into either privately between the parties, or upon a sale by auction. At common law, agreements for the purchase of real estates might be made by parol, but by the Statute of Frauds (29 Car. II. c. 3, ss. 1, 2, 3, and 4), "All leases, estates, interests of freeholds, or terms of years, or any uncertain interest of; in, or out of any messuages, manors, lands, tenements, or hereditaments, made and created by livery and seisin only, or by parol only, and not put in writing by the parties so making or creating the same, or their agents thereunto lawfully authorized by writing, shall have the effect of leases or estates at will, any consideration for snaking any such parol leases or estates not withstanding." But leases not exceeding three years, whereupon the rent reserved should amount to two-thirds of the full improved value, were excepted. The act requires the assignment, grant, and sur render of existing interests to be in writ ing, and enacts that "no action shall be brought whereby to charge any person upon any agreement made upon any con tract or sale of lands, tenements, or here ditaments, or any interest in or concern ing them, unless the agreement upon which such action shall be brought, or some memorandum or note thereof shall be in writing, and signed by the party to be charged therewith, or some other per son thereunto by him lawfully authorised." The note or memorandum of agreement re quired by the statute need not be a formal document, and any writing, such as a letter, or receipt for purchase-money, may constitute an agreement within the sta tute, provided it contain the terms of the agreement within itself, or by reference to another writing; and if the document be written by the party, the occurrence of his name anywhere in the document is a sufficient signing.
Upon sales of estates by public auction, the highest bidder, upon being declared the purchaser, is considered to have en tered into a contract for purchase accord ing to the particulars and subject to the conditions of sale ; and the auctioneer, who is for this purpose considered as the agent of both vendor and purchaser, is thereupon authorized to sign an agree ment of purchase. The writing down the purchaser's name upon any memoran dum of sale at the time of the bidding is a sufficient signing. Sales by auction of lands are within the above-mentioned enactments of the Statute of Frauds ; but sales before a master under a decree of a court of equity will be carried into exe cution although the purchaser did not subscribe any agreement, for the judg ment of the court in confirming the pur chase takes it out of the statute. An auc tion duty of 7d. in the pound is payable upon all sales by auction of any interest in freehold, copyhold, or leasehold lands, tenements, houses, or hereditaments (27 Geo. III. c. 36 ; 37 Geo. III. c. 14 ; and 45 Geo. HI. c. 30). The subject of the sale and purchase of estates is discussed at length in Sugden's Treatise on the Law of Vendors and Purchasers of Estates.