Protective Equity Trust #83, Ltd. v. Bybee

In Protective Equity Trust #83, Ltd. v. Bybee (1991) 2 Cal.App.4th 139, the seller "struck" certain portions of the agreement, including "a statement giving notice that the subordination agreement contained a provision under which buyer was allowed to use portions of the construction loan for purposes other than improvement of the property." (Protective Equity, supra, 2 Cal.App.4th at p. 143.) The escrow instructions between the seller and the buyer were later amended to provide: "'Buyer agrees to delete paragraph in the subordination agreement and warrants all funds from the development loan will be used to develop the property.'" (Ibid.) The Court of Appeal held the lenders could not enforce the subordination agreement because the lenders were "aware that seller had agreed to subordinate only to a construction loan" and "the terms of the agreement under which seller agreed to subordinate were not complied with." (Id. at p. 150.) This was true notwithstanding the fact the subordination agreement retained "a provision disclaiming any obligation by the lenders to oversee the use of the proceeds of their loan." (Id. at p. 143.) The Protective Equity court explained: "Lenders' refusal to undertake that supervision, however, did not insulate them from risk of loss in the event that buyer failed to meet the terms of its agreement with seller. As a third party beneficiary of the agreement between seller and buyer, lenders cannot now seek to enforce seller's obligation under the agreement once the agreement has been breached by buyer. Lenders cannot assert greater rights than those of buyer under the subordination agreement , and under the agreement buyer would not have been able to force seller to subordinate to a loan other than a construction loan. " (Id. at p. 151.)