MARGARITA S. MAYORES AND LUCIA D. ABENA, PETITIONERS, VS. INTERMEDIATE APPELLATE COURT, HON. NICOLAS A. GEROCHI, JR., IN HIS CAPACITY AS PRESIDING JUDGE, REGIONAL TRIAL COURT, M…

Mayores versus Intermediate Appellate Court

The Case

This is a petition for review brought by Margarita Mayores and Lucia Abena, two elderly spinster sisters who own in common a duplex apartment in Makati. One unit is their own residence; the other was leased to the private respondents. When the sisters sought to eject their lessees on the ground of personal need, the lower courts refused, holding that the nieces for whom they wanted to make room were not "immediate members of the family" under the rent control law. The case matters because the Supreme Court read the law not with cold literalism but with humanity, and held that the owner's own imperative need to be cared for in old age and infirmity is itself a ground for judicial ejectment.

Procedural History

The petitioners filed suit for ejectment in the Municipal Court of Makati in March 1981. The Municipal Court ruled in their favor, finding a right to repossess under Section 5, paragraph c of Batas Pambansa Blg. 25, and ordered the lessees to vacate, to pay rentals in arrears, attorney's fees, and costs.

On appeal, the Regional Trial Court reversed. It held that the nieces did not fall within the periphery of immediate members of the family contemplated by the law, and declared that the lessees had the right to continue as lessees-occupants, even awarding them attorney's fees.

The Intermediate Appellate Court affirmed the Regional Trial Court. The petitioners then came to the Supreme Court, which reversed both lower courts and reinstated the judgment of ejectment.

Facts

The petitioners are septuagenarians, old and sickly spinsters, co-owners of a duplex house and the land on which it stands on Mayapis Street in Makati. They live in one unit; the private respondents, Adela Mikasol and her husband, occupied the other under a verbal lease at a monthly rental of 390 pesos plus 20 pesos for electricity.

On May 25, 1979, the petitioners sent a letter of demand giving the lessees three months to vacate, because they needed the premises for their personal use. They wanted their two nieces, Alma Abena-Salazar and Cleofe Reyes, to occupy the unit, since these nieces prepare their food and attend to their needs. Alma lived in Palanan, Makati, and Cleofe's husband was scheduled to leave for abroad. If they recovered possession, the petitioners planned to remove the partition and convert the duplex into one unit. A second demand letter followed on February 3, 1980. The matter reached the barangay, but no settlement was reached, and a certification to file the case was issued.

Only the petitioners presented evidence; the private respondents offered none despite several postponements. The Municipal Court found for the petitioners, but the Regional Trial Court and the Intermediate Appellate Court reversed on the ground that the nieces were not immediate members of the family.

Issues

• Whether or not the petitioners may judicially eject their lessees under Section 5, paragraph c of Batas Pambansa Blg. 25 on the ground of personal need, when the persons for whom room is to be made are the owners' nieces and not immediate members of their family.
• Whether or not the petitioners' own imperative need to be assisted and attended to in their old age and infirmities constitutes a sufficient ground for repossession of the leased unit.

Applicable Provisions

Section 5, paragraph c of Batas Pambansa Blg. 25 provides:

Need of owner/lessor to repossess his property for his own use or for the use of any immediate member of his family as a residential unit, such owner or immediate member not being the owner of any other available residential unit: Provided, however, That the period of the lease has expired: Provided, further, That the lessor has given the lessee notice three months in advance of the lessor's intention to repossess the property: and Provided, finally, That the owner/lessor or immediate member stays in the residential unit for at least one year, except for justifiable cause.

This is the very ground invoked by the petitioners, and the lower courts denied it by reading "immediate member of his family" strictly to exclude the nieces.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the lower courts misread the undisputed facts. The eviction was not sought principally because the place was needed for the personal use of the nieces. It was sought because of the petitioners' own imperative need to be assisted, ministered to, and attended to in their old age and infirmities, and the accompanying necessity to make room in their home for the persons who would thus care for them, namely their nieces and their families. To interpret the facts as the lower courts did would be logically unwarranted and would result in an unkind and oppressive application of the law.

On the second issue, the Court turned to its own precedents. In Ongchengco versus City Court of Zamboanga, it had held that an old man of seventy-five, sick and disabled, was entitled to judicial ejectment, because denying him the return of his property would be tantamount to depriving him not only of his constitutional right to his property but his right of survival. In Betts versus Matias, it ruled that it would be inhuman and inequitous to deny an aged couple the occupancy of part of their own dwelling. In Sinclair versus Court of Appeals, it held that a strict and rigid compliance with the rent law was not in order, for an exemption was warranted for humanitarian reasons where there was extreme necessity for personal use of the property. The Court found analogous considerations here and granted relief.

Doctrine

The need of the owner or lessor to repossess the property for his own use under Section 5, paragraph c of Batas Pambansa Blg. 25 is not limited to the literal case of an immediate member of the family occupying the unit. Where the owner's own imperative need to be assisted and attended to in old age and infirmity requires making room in his home for persons who will care for him, that need is itself a ground for judicial ejectment. The rent control law must be applied with humanitarian and equitable consideration, not with strict and rigid literalism, so as not to become an instrument of unkind and oppressive application. Extreme necessity for personal use of the property entitles the owner to relief, for to deny him the return of his own home may deprive him not only of his right to property but of his right of survival.

Disposition

The Court reversed and set aside the decisions of the Intermediate Appellate Court and the Regional Trial Court, and ordered the private respondents to vacate the premises and surrender them to the petitioners, to pay rentals in arrears at 300 pesos monthly from February 1981 until fully vacated, less payments made, plus 1,000 pesos in attorney's fees and costs, with the decision immediately executory.

Remember This

Memorize this line: the owner's imperative need to be cared for in old age and infirmity is itself a ground for judicial ejectment, and the rent law is read with humanity, not literalism. Examiners use this case to test the humanitarian interpretation of Section 5, paragraph c of Batas Pambansa Blg. 25 and the rule that rent control laws cannot be used to oppress an aged owner in his own home.