Hocking v. Guello
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Citation treatment has not been reviewed for this case. The notes below come from the citation graph and the Minnesota Revisor's amendment records, not from a review of how later courts treated this decision.
(as of 9/30/2026)
Last cited by a Minnesota appellate court in 1979, among the opinions in this site’s citation index.
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Cases that cite this one
1 later published case cites this decision.
- First Fiduciary Corp. v. Blanco (Minn. 1979)
This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.
Opinion
This is an action brought by a legatee against the grantees in a deed to set aside a conveyance from the decedent. The trial court held that because the property was the grantor’s homestead and her husband was incompetent to join in the conveyance, it was void. We affirm.
At the time the deed was executed on May 3, 1968, the real estate in question, located in Itasca County, was owned jointly by C. W. French and his wife, Mamie French, as their homestead. A deed to the property was prepared by defendant Samuel J. Guello naming himself and his wife as grantees and reciting a consideration of $1. It is undisputed that when the deed was executed Mr. French was incompetent and his wife guided his hand in attaching his signature to the instrument. 1
The deed contained the following recitation:
“Parties of the first part shall retain possession of the above described tracts of land for the remainder of their natural lives.”
Defendants assert that the retention of a life estate in the grantors preserves the validity of the deed, citing Ferguson v. Mason, 60 Wis. 377, 19 N. W. 420 (1884); and Reilly v. Reilly, 135 Iowa 440, 110 N. W. 445 (1907).
Minn. St. 507.02 provides in part:
“If the owner be married, no mortgage of the homestead, except for purchase money unpaid thereon, nor any sale or other alienation thereof shall be valid without the signatures of both husband and wife.”
Whatever may be the rule in Wisconsin and Iowa, our statute and cases construing it make it clear that any alienation of the homestead without both husband and wife joining is void. Marr v. Bradley, 239 Minn. 503, 59 N. W. 2d 331 (1953). Nor do the facts give rise to the application of the doctrine of estoppel which governed our decision in Seitz v. Sitze, 215 Minn. 452, 10 N. W. 2d 426 (1943). The judgment of the trial court is accordingly affirmed.
Affirmed.
Although the administrator of the nursing home where Mr. French was confined testified that he didn’t think Mr. French knew what he was signing, the administrator nevertheless took his acknowledgment and certified that Mr. French executed the instrument as his free act and deed. We cannot too strongly condemn this violation of Minn. St. 609.65 (2).
Case-law data current through September 30, 2026. Source: CourtListener bulk data.