Why did a woman spend 1.3 million to buy a house and when she was renovating it, she was told by her neighbors that it was a "haunted house"?
After paying the deposit for the house, Ms. Zhou from Shanghai started to renovate it. During a casual chat with her neighbor, she unexpectedly learned that the seller’s son had died of illness in the house. Ms. Zhou had a grudge and refused to pay the remaining payment on the grounds that it was a "haunted house".
A few days ago, the Shanghai Fengxian District People’s Court ruled in the first instance that the defendant buyer should pay the plaintiff seller the remaining house payment and interest within 10 days.
In February 2014, Ms. Zhou, who lives in Fengxian Nanqiao, Shanghai, took a fancy to a house in Guhua New Village through an agency. She was very satisfied with the location, floor plan, orientation, etc. of the house, and she also traveled a lot. Convenient, with basic facilities such as markets and supermarkets readily available. In addition, the seller, Mr. Ji, and his wife are honest people and are locals from Fengxian. The two parties negotiated very smoothly and immediately signed an intermediary contract, agreeing on a total house price of 1.3 million yuan.
After paying a deposit of 30,000 yuan, Mr. Ji handed over the house key to Ms. Zhou. After receiving it, Ms. Zhou renovated the house in question. During the performance process, Ms. Zhou paid the house payment of 400,000 yuan in two installments.
By chance, Ms. Zhou learned from a neighbor that Mr. Ji’s son had died of illness. Ms. Zhou’s mother was very particular about Feng Shui and was very concerned about this matter. She believed that the house where the death occurred was the "Haunted house" has too much Yin energy and can easily get into trouble. As a result, Ms. Zhou's family quickly moved out of the house involved in the case, returned to their old house, and prepared to terminate the contract.
At the same time, Mr. Ji came to ask for the remaining house payment, but Ms. Zhou's family was unwilling to pay. Because of this, the two sides almost came to blows and alerted the neighborhood committee.
Since then, Mr. Ji has repeatedly demanded payment for the house, but Ms. Zhou has refused to pay on the grounds that it is a "haunted house". Mr. Ji has moved out of this house for many years and has been renting it out for a long time. Although his son Xiao Ji had lived there in his early years, he eventually died in the hospital, and even Xiao Ji's household registration was not in the house. In desperation, Mr. Ji took Ms. Zhou to court and asked Ms. Zhou to continue to perform the contract.
During the trial, Ms. Zhou argued that she paid 430,000 yuan for the house and contributed 50,000 yuan to decorate the house. However, because Mr. Ji's son once lived there and died young due to illness, the house was a haunted house, which was unlucky for him and his family. The family no longer lived there, so they were unwilling to continue to perform the contract and filed a lawsuit with the court. Counterclaim, requiring Mr. Ji to refund the house payment and compensate for losses.
After trial, the court held that according to general folk customs, houses where "suicides", "homicides" and other abnormal deaths have occurred are often considered to have unlucky elements, which are the so-called "haunted houses". The value of the house itself will also be reduced as a result.
In this case, Mr. Ji’s son died of illness, which is a normal phenomenon of birth, old age, illness and death, and the house he lived in was not a “haunted house” in the popular sense. On the premise that the house in question is not a "haunted house", Mr. Ji does not need to bear any further disclosure obligations. The plaintiff had fulfilled its contractual obligations as agreed, and its claim to require the defendant to pay the remaining house payment and interest was well-founded in law. The court made the above judgment accordingly and rejected all the defendant's counterclaims.