Goh Teh Lee v Lim Li Pheng Maria and others

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Chao Hick Tin JA
• Judgment Date: 26 April 2010
• Neutral Citation: [2010] SGCA 18
• Plaintiff Counsel: The appellant in person
• Docket Number: Civil Appeal No 134 of 2009/N
• Date: 26 April 2010
• Hearing Date: 25 February 2010,02 March 2010
• Subject Matter: Land,Strata Titles,Collective Sales
• Published date: 17 June 2010
• Citation: [2010] SGCA 18
• Defendant Counsel: Chelva Rajah SC, Cheah Kok Lim and Leong Kwok Yan (Leong Kwok Yan)
• Court: Court of Appeal (Singapore)
• Year: 2010

Chao Hick Tin JA (delivering the grounds of decision of the court): Introduction

This was an appeal by the appellant, Goh Teh Lee (“Mr Goh”), against the decision of the High Court in OS No 1627 of 2008. The judge in the court below (“the Judge”) upheld the Strata Titles Board’s (“the Board”) decision in STB No. 33 of 2008 where it granted an order, pursuant to s 84E of the Land Titles (Strata) Act (Cap 158, 1999 Rev Ed) (“the Act”), for the collective sale of a development (“the Development”) comprising of a four-storey block containing 24 flats (“Koon Seng House”) and nine pre-war terrace houses, making a total of 33 units.

The facts

Mr Goh is the co-owner of one of the 24 flats (“Unit 136D”) and the sole dissentient in the proposed collective sale of the Development. We should explain that at the time of the hearings before the Board and the Judge, Mr Goh was involved in divorce proceedings with his then-wife, the other co-owner of Unit 136D, who agreed to the collective sale and appended her signature to the relevant documents. The respondents to this appeal, Lim Li Pheng Maria, Liew Yeow Siang, and Gobindram s/o Ramchand Chandumal (collectively “the respondents”), are members of the sales committee representing the proprietors forming the majority in the application for the collective sale of the Development.

This collective sale was unusual in the sense that it involved a property which had a mixed development on it, consisting of not only flats (which is normally the case), but also of terrace houses all on one piece of freehold land which had not been subdivided. The 24 flats were not strata subdivided but were comprised in 999,999 year leases with no share in the land. There was no separate subdivided title for the terrace houses either. The single owner of the terrace houses (now deceased), who was also the proprietor of the land, therefore held her freehold interest in the land subject to the leases of the 24 flats.

The idea of a collective sale was first raised in late 2006. By mid 2007, a collective sale agreement (“the CSA”) was signed by the owners of 27 out of the 33 units in the Development. Later, upon realising that the stipulated reserve price for the collective sale was too high, the owners, who were agreeable to the collective sale, agreed to reduce the same. A supplemental agreement (“Supplemental CSA”) to that effect was signed by the owners of 30 out of 33 units (which included the owners of 21 out of the 24 flats). The majority then applied for and obtained an allotment of notional share value for each flat and terrace house. Subsequently, on 16 April 2008, an application to the Board for a collective sale order in respect of the Development was lodged, whereupon Mr Goh objected to the same. Despite Mr Goh’s objections, the Board made a collective sale order (“the Order”) under s 84E of the Act as it stood prior to the Land Titles (Strata) (Amendment) Act 2007 (No 46 of 2007) and the Statutes (Miscellaneous Amendments) (No 2) Act 2008 (No 30 of 2008). However, these subsequent amendments to the Act did not concern the present case. Dissatisfied, Mr Goh lodged an appeal against the Board’s decision to the High Court, seeking to halt the collective sale.

Before the Board and the High Court, Mr Goh raised numerous grounds of objection to the collective sale. They were, inter alia: The method of distribution for the sale proceeds (which was equal distribution of the sale proceeds among the 33 units) was unfair. Mr Goh argued that the notional share value or floor area of each unit was not taken into account. The “valuation method” of distribution should have been chosen instead; It was not possible to determine if the required 80% majority had been obtained as notional share values were only assigned after the majority had executed the CSA. In any case, the 80% share value was in fact not obtained; The application to the Board for a collective sale order was out of time. Mr Goh argued that the application was not made within 12 months after the first 18 owners appended their signatures to the first CSA; Numerous breaches of mandatory statutory provisions of the Act had been committed and the Board could not waive the same; There was an injunction made by the Subordinate Court in the course of the matrimonial proceedings between Mr Goh and his then-wife which prevented Mr Goh from disposing of his assets, and the Board did not have the power to override the order of the Subordinate Court; and Pursuant to s 84E(11) of the Act, the owner of the nine terrace houses was not entitled to the proceeds of the collective sale. Being dissatisfied with his appeal being dismissed by the High Court, Mr Goh then further appealed to this court, seeking to reverse the Judge’s decision.

Preliminary issue before this court

Prior to the scheduled hearing of the appeal, we asked for submissions on whether it was necessary, under the existing scheme for collective sales, for co-owners (whether by way of joint tenancy or common tenancy) to act together if they wanted to either support or oppose a proposed sale. The answer to this question was pivotal, as it would determine whether Mr Goh had the locus standi to lodge not only the appeal before us, but also the appeal before the court below, and his objections before the Board. Should Mr Goh lack the requisite locus standi, it would mean that he would not have a right to address us on the merits of his case, viz, his substantive objections to the collective sale.

Having analysed and considered the submissions of both parties, we concluded that all co-owners had to act together to either support or oppose a proposed sale. As Mr Goh’s ex-wife, the other co-owner of unit 136D, did not object to the collective sale, and had in fact agreed to the collective sale, we found that Mr Goh did not have the locus standi to appeal against the Board’s Order (be it before this court or the High Court) or to object before the Board in relation to the proposed collective sale of the Development. Accordingly, we dismissed his appeal before us. We now set out the reasons for our decision.

The nature of co-ownership

Our decision that all co-owners must act together to either support or oppose a proposed sale is premised on first, the nature of the interest that is being held by the co-owners, specifically, the concurrent interests in the same property, and second, the collective sale regime set out under the Act.

It is trite law that an interest in the same property can be owned by two or more persons at the same time, thereby entitling them to simultaneous enjoyment of that property. This form of concurrent ownership of an interest in land is known as co-ownership. Its increasing prevalence in Singapore reflects family patterns of today and the rising cost of housing.

There are two types of co-ownership in Singapore, viz, joint tenancy and tenancy in common (For a general discussion on the nature of joint tenancy and tenancy in common, see Halsbury’s Laws of Singapore vol 14 (Lexis Nexis, 2009 Reissue) at paras 170.0034-170.0037 and 170.0046-170.0048; Kevin Gray & Susan Francis Gray, Elements of Land Law (Oxford University Press, 5th Ed, 2009) at pp 913-926, Robert Megarry and William Wade, The Law of Real Property (Sweet & Maxwell, 7th Ed, 2008) at pp 489-494; and Tan Sook Yee, Tang Hang Wu & Kelvin FK Low, Tan Sook Yee’s Principles of Singapore Land Law (Lexis Nexis, 3rd Ed, 2009) at pp 187-191).

Joint tenancy is that form of co-ownership where each of the co-owners is entitled to the whole of the interest which is the subject of co-ownership. In a joint-tenancy, each joint tenant holds the whole jointly and nothing severally: quilibet totum tenet et nihil tenet; scilicet, totum in communi, et nihil separatism per se [each holds the entirety and yet holds nothing; that is, the entirety in common, and nothing separately by itself]. Joint tenants have rights inter se, but against the world they are seen as one single owner. Thus, no one joint tenant holds any specific or distinct share of the co-owned interest himself. Rather, the interest of each joint tenant is identical and lies in the whole and every part of the land, and none of that land is held by one joint tenant to the exclusion of the rest. Blackstone wrote (Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England vol 2 (London, 15th Ed, 1809) at p 181):

Joint-tenants are said to be seised per my et per tout [by half and by all], by the half or moiety, and by all: that is, they each of them have the entire possession, as well of every parcel as of the whole. They have not, one of them a seisin of one half or moiety, and the other of the other moiety; neither can one be exclusively seised of one acre, and his companion of another; but each has an undivided moiety of the whole, and not the whole of an undivided moiety. [original emphasis in italics, emphasis in bold italics added]

This position was reaffirmed recently by Lee Seiu Kin J in Shafeeg bin Salim Talib and another (administrators of the estate of Obeidillah bin Salim bin Talib, deceased) v Fatimah bte Abud bin Talib and others [2009] 3 SLR(R) 439 (“Shafeeg HC”). The learned judge wrote at [9] quoting from Megarry and Wade: The Law of Real Property (Sweet & Maxwell, 7th Ed, 2008) at 13-003 that “it is often said … that each joint tenant holds nothing by himself and yet holds the whole together with the other”. We should add that Shafeeg HC went on appeal to this court which very recently (after we had decided in the present appeal) released its judgment affirming the determination of the court below on this point (Shafeeg bin Salim Talib and another (administrators of the estate of Obeidillah bin Salim bin Talib, deceased) v Fatimah bte Abud bin Talib and others [2010] SGCA 11 (“Shafeeg CA”)). This court in Shafeeg CA stated at [39] and [40]:

… in a joint tenancy no interest in the...