Glad Tidings Church of America v. Hinkley, 71 Ariz. 306, 226 P.2d 1016 (Ariz. 1951)
Legal information, not legal advice. Verify against the cited opinion.
- Citation: 71 Ariz. 306, 226 P.2d 1016 (1951)
- Court / Year: Arizona Supreme Court, 1951
- Topic tags: forfeiture · equitable_interest · land_contract
- Facts: A church purchased real property under a land contract (contract for deed) and fell into default. The vendor served a notice of forfeiture. The church had been in default for nearly seven years and offered no evidence to excuse or explain the prolonged default before seeking to set the forfeiture aside.
- Holding: The law does not favor forfeitures; a vendor who invokes a contractual forfeiture clause must comply strictly with all the requirements of the contract. A notice of forfeiture that expresses the vendor’s readiness, willingness, and ability to tender a deed upon payment is a sufficient tender. On the facts — a seven-year unexplained default — equity would not relieve against the forfeiture, because no equitable ground for relief was shown; had the buyer tendered performance within a reasonable time after the cancellation notice, it could have obtained specific performance.
- Reasoning: Arizona equity disfavors forfeitures and construes contracts to avoid them, but equity intervenes only where the defaulting buyer presents an equitable basis (e.g., timely tender, excusable default, substantial equity at stake). A buyer who sleeps on its rights for years forfeits the equitable claim to relief.
- Practical impact for CFD operators/buyers: The foundational Arizona statement that forfeitures are disfavored and require strict compliance with the contract’s terms — the common-law backdrop against which the modern statutory forfeiture procedure (A.R.S. §§ 33-741 to 33-749) operates. For a seller, a defective forfeiture notice is fatal; for a buyer, equitable relief is available but must be sought promptly with clean hands.
- Good-law status: Good law as a statement of Arizona’s anti-forfeiture equitable policy; the procedural forfeiture mechanics it discussed (former Code 1939 § 71-126) have since been superseded by the statutory forfeiture regime in A.R.S. Title 33, Ch. 6, Art. 3.
- Source (retrieved): https://law.justia.com/cases/arizona/supreme-court/1951/5182-0.html (citation and holding corroborated via https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/5914a09dadd7b0493467c063) · Verified: 2026-06-08
Jurisdictions that follow / cite: arizona
Disclaimer. Legal information, not legal advice. Confirm the opinion is still good law before relying on it.