ALVAREZ v IAC
185 SCRA 8 May 7, 1990
Aniceto Yanes was survived by his children, Rufino, Felipe and Teodora. Herein private respondents, Estelita, Iluminado and Jesus, are the children of Rufino who died in 1962 while the other private respondents, Antonio and Rosario Yanes, are children of Felipe. Teodora was survivedby her child, Jovita (Jovito) Alib. There are two parcels of land which are involved in this case. Said lots were registered in the names of the heirs of Aniceto Yanes. Fortunato D. Santiago was issued a Transfer Certificate of Title. Santiago then sold the lots to Monico B. Fuentebella, Jr. The lots were sold thereafter Rosendo Alvarez. The Yaneses filed a complaint against Santiago, Arsenia Vda. de Fuentebella, Alvarez and the Register of Deeds of Negros Occidental for the “return” of the ownership and possession of the lots, and prayed for an accounting of the produce of the land from 1944 up to the filing of the complaint, and that the share or money equivalent due the heirs be delivered to them, and damages. During the pendency of the case, Alvarez sold the lots to Dr. Rodolfo Siason.
ISSUE: Whether the liability arising from the sale of the lots made by Rosendo Alvarez to Dr.Rodolfo Siason should be the sole liability of the late Rosendo Alvarez or of his estate, after his death.
As a general rule is that a party’s contractual rights and obligations are transmissible to the successors. However, in this case Petitioners being the heirs of the late Rosendo Alvarez, cannot escape the legal consequences of their father’s transaction, which gave rise to the present claim for damages. That petitioners did not inherit the property involved herein is of no moment because by legal fiction, the monetary equivalent thereof devolved into the mass of their father’s hereditary estate, and we have ruled that the hereditary assets are always liable in their totality for the payment of the debts of the estate.
It must, however, be made clear that petitioners are liable only to the extent of the value of their inheritance.
