Eliseo Fajardo

ELISEO FAJARDO, JR., and MARISSA FAJARDO, petitioners, vs. FREEDOM TO BUILD, INC., respondent.
Freedom to Build, Incorporated, an owner-developer and seller of lowcost housing, sold to petitioner-spouses, a house and lot. The Contract to Sell executed between the parties, contained a Restrictive Covenant providing certain prohibitions. The restrictions were also contained in Transfer Certificate of Title covering the lot issued in the name of petitioner-spouses. The controversy arose when petitioners, despite repeated warnings from respondent, extended the roof of their house to the property line and expanded the second floor of their house to a point directly above the original front wall. Respondent filed an action to demolish the unauthorized structures. In their petition for review, the spouses contest the judgment of the courts. Per the contract between Freedom to Build Incorporated and the De la Costa Low Income Project Homeowners' Association (hereinafter homeowners' association), petitioners aver, the enforcement of the prohibitions contained in the "Restrictive Covenant" originally residing on respondent is now lodged in the homeowners' association. Petitioners maintain that it is incumbent upon the homeowners' association, not on respondent, to enforce compliance with the provisions of the covenant. The provisions in a restrictive covenant prescribing the type of the building to be erected are crafted not solely for the purpose of creating easements, generally of light and view, nor as a restriction as to the type of construction, but may also be aimed as a check on the subsequent uses of the building conformably with what the developer originally might have intended the stipulations to be.
[16] [17]
. Petitioners raise the issue of the personality of respondent to enforce the provisions of the covenant. lack of a specific provision, prescribing the penalty of demolition in the "Restrictive Covenant"
Broadly speaking, a suit for equitable enforcement of a restrictive covenant can only be made by one for whose benefit it is intended. It is not thus normally enforceable by one who has no right nor interest in the land for the benefit of which the restriction has been
[19]
imposed. Thus, a developer of a subdivision can enforce restrictions, even as against remote grantees of lots, only if he retains part of the land. There would have been merit in the argument of petitioners - that respondent, having relinquished ownership of the subdivision to the homeowners, is precluded from claiming any right or interest on the same property - had not the homeowners' association, confirmed by its board of directors, allowed respondent to enforce the provisions of the restrictive covenant.
[20] [21]
Finally, petitioners argue that for lack of a specific provision, prescribing the penalty of demolition in the "Restrictive Covenant" in the event of a breach thereof, the prayer of respondent to demolish the structure should fail. This argument has no merit; Article 1168 of the New Civil Code states: "When the obligation consists in not doing and the obligor does what has been forbidden him, it shall be undone at his expense." This Court is not unaware of its ruling in Ayala Corporation vs. Ray Burton Development Corporation, which has merely adjudged the payment of damages in lieu of demolition. In the aforementioned case, however, the elaborate mathematical formula for the determination of compensatory damages which takes into account the current construction cost index during the immediately preceding 5 years based on the weighted average of wholesale price and wage indices of the National Census and Statistics Office and the Bureau of Labor Statistics is explicitly provided for in the Deed of Restrictions entered into by the parties. This unique and peculiar circumstance, among other strong justifications therein mentioned, is not extant in the case at bar.
[22]
In sum, the Court holds that (1)....The provisions of the Restrictive Covenant are valid; (2)....Petitioners must be held to be bound thereby; and (3)....Since the extension constructed exceeds the floor area limits of the Restrictive Covenant, petitioner-spouses can be required to demolish the structure to the extent that it exceeds the prescribed floor area limits.

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ELISEO FAJARDO, JR., and MARISSA FAJARDO, petitioners, vs. FREEDOM TO BUILD, INC., respondent.

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