G.R. No. L-26752. March 19, 1971
PATERNO SANTOS, ET AL., PETITIONERS, LEONILA POLICARPIO, PETITIONER-APPELLANT, VS. REGISTER OF DEEDS OF MANILA AND PABLO LUCAS, RESPONDENTS-APPELLEES.
CONCEPCION, C.J.:
Appeal, taken by Leonila
Policarpio, from a resolution of the Land
Registration Commission.
The pertinent facts are
not disputed. In the language of the
resolution appealed from:
“The facts on record are as follows: It appears that on March 7, 1959, Natividad Sanchez and Pablo Lucas bought from Imelda Reyes
and Maria Consuelo Mendoza a parcel of land together with its improvements,
situated in the City of Manila and covered by TCT No. 34200, with assumption of
an P8, 000 real estate mortgage in favor of the Monte de Piedad
and Savings Bank. By virtue of the said
sale TCT No. 57134 was issued in the name of the above-mentioned vendee. In view, however, of the violation of some
terms in the mortgage contract by the mortgagors, the mortgagee-bank initiated
foreclosure proceedings and in the public auction sale Leonila Policarpio was adjudged the highest
bidder. On September 2, 1963 Policarpio filed
the Sheriff’s Certificate of Sale for registration in the office of the
respondent Register of Deeds and the same was entered under Primary Entry No.
3118/V-37. However, due to the fact
that there were some defects in the documents as pointed out by the said
Register of Deeds, the registrant withdrew the same on the following day, September
3, 1963, and they were
not re-entered for registration until almost a year after — on August
26, 1964.
“On July 7,
1965, Policarpio assigned all her rights and interests in the
certificate of sale in favor of Mr. Paterno Santos
who in turn had it registered on July 19, 1965. On
August 17, 1965, one of the herein mortgagors exercised his right to redeem the
property subject of the auction sale by paying to the Sheriff of Manila the
amount of P8,519.07 representing
the purchase price and interests due thereon, and so was issued a certificate
of redemption, dated August 21, 1965.
The redemptioner presented the said
certificate of redemption for registration in the office of the Manila Registry
but was withheld pending submission of the owner’s duplicate certificate of
title. On the other hand, the Monte de Piedad and Savings Bank, as attorney-in-fact of the vendee
in the auction sale, probably not knowing that the property was already
redeemed, executed on September 6, 1965 a Deed of Absolute Sale in favor of Leonila Policarpio, who, in turn,
confirmed her assignment of rights in favor of Paterno
Santos on September 8, 1965. The
Deed of Confirmation of Assignment as well as the affidavit of consolidation
previously executed by Santos were annotated on TCT No. 57134, on September
10, 1965, but then,
it was discovered that the certificate of redemption which was earlier
presented was still pending registration.”[1]
In view of the issue that had thus arisen, as to whether the
certificate of redemption executed in favor of Pablo Lucas should have
preference over the deed of confirmation of assignment in favor of Paterno Santos and the affidavit of consolidation
previously executed by him, the Register of Deeds of Manila – although
“inclined to believe” that
the issue should be resolved in the affirmative – submitted the matter for
consultation to the Commissioner of Land Registration who, after due
hearing, issued a resolution, the dispositive part of
which reads:
“All the foregoing considered, this Commission believes and so
orders that the certificate of redemption should be given preference in
registration to the affidavit of consolidation; hence the registration of the
certificate of redemption may be given
due course once the owner’s duplicate certificate of title is presented and
the corresponding fees are duly paid.
Let the Register of Deeds therefore, be guided accordingly.”
A reconsideration of this resolution having been denied, Leonila Policarpio interposed the
present appeal. The same hinges on the
question whether the redemption period of “one year from and after the
date of the sale,” prescribed in section 6 of Act No. 3135, as amended by
Act No. 4118, for the redemption of property sold in extrajudicial foreclosure
proceedings, should be computed from the date of the auction sale, in September
1963, as contended by appellant, or from August 26, 1964, when the Sheriff’s
Certificate of Sale was registered with the Office of the Register of Deeds of
Manila, as held by the Commissioner of Land Registration in his appealed
resolution.
This issue has long been
settled in favor of the ruling made in the contested resolution. As early as June 30, 1959, We have held that
the period of redemption “begins to run not from the date of sale but from the time of registration of
the sale in the Office of the Register of Deeds.” This view, expressed in
Garcia v. Ocampo, et al.,1 was
reiterated in Agbulos v. Alberto.2 Although
these cases referred to execution sales, the rule therein laid down was applied
to foreclosure cases in Salazar, et al. v. Meneses,
et al.,3 Reyes v. Noblejas, et
al.,4 Rosario, et al. v. Tayug
Rural Bank, Inc.,5 Campillo
v. Philippine National Bank,6 and Reyes
v. Manas, et al.7 In
Reyes v. Noblejas, et al.,1 this Court
even held:
“But it is further argued by the petitioner that the rule
should not be applied to this case where there are no third parties
involved. He cites a number of
authorities, to the effect that as between the parties, registration is not
necessary to bind the immediate parties to a transaction involving registered
land. He would then conclude that since
the only purpose of registration is to protect the buyer from third party
claims, it stands to reason that when, as in this case, there are no third
party claimants to the land, registration is not necessary and the sale between
the parties should be made to take effect from the date of the auction
sale. We are not impressed by the
argument. Apparently, herein petitioner
failed to see the ‘other side of the coin’ and overlooked the doctrine, also
well settled, that the registration required by Section 50 of the Land
Registration Law is intended primarily for the protection of innocent third
persons, i.e., persons who, without knowledge of the sale and in good faith,
have acquired rights to the property.
The same protection to third parties is obviously one of the objects of
Section 27, Rule 39 of the Revised Rules of Court in requiring that the
certificate of sale issued by the sheriff in an auction sale be registered in
the office of the register of deeds, for the purpose of the legislature in
providing for our present system of registration is to afford some means of
publicity so that persons dealing with real property may reach the records and
thereby acquire security against instruments the execution of which has not
been revealed. Redemption is not the concern merely of
the auction-vendee and the mortgagor, but also of the latter’s successors in
interest or any judicial creditor or judgment creditor of said mortgagor, or
any person having a lien on the property subsequent to the mortgage under which
the property has been sold. It is
precisely for this reason that the certificate of sale should be registered,
for only upon such registration may it legally be said that proper notice,
though constructive, has been served unto possible redemptioners
contemplated in the law. We have to
conclude, therefore, that the date of sale mentioned in Section 6 of Act 3135,
as amended, should be construed to mean the date of registration of the
certificate of sale in the office of the register of deeds concerned. Only after the lapse of the twelve-month
redemption period from the date of registration of the certificate of sale and
in the absence of any redemptioner within the said
period, may the deed of final sale be executed in favor of the purchaser who
may then consolidate the title of the property in his favor. Consequently, We have to declare that the
Land Registration Commissioner was right in ordering the Register of Deeds of Rizal to deny the registration of the Deed of Sale and the
Affidavit of Consolidation of Ownership, the simultaneous registration of
which documents was sought by herein petitioner even before the certificate of
sale issued by the sheriff was registered.”
WHEREFORE, the resolution appealed from is hereby
affirmed, with costs against appellant Leonila Policarpio.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Reyes, Dizon, Makalintal,
Zaldivar, Ruiz Castro, Fernando, Teehankee, Barredo,
Villamor, and Makasiar,
JJ., concur.
[1]
Record on Appeal, pp. 6-8.
1 105 Phil.
1102, 1108. Underscoring
supplied.
2 L-17483, July 31, 1962.
3 L-15378, July 31, 1963.
4 L-23691, November 25, 1967.
5 L-26538, March 21, 1968.
6 L-19890, May 21, 1969.
7 L-27755, October 4, 1969.
1 Supra.