G.R. No.

202324

CONCHITA GLORIA and MARIA LOURDES GLORIAPA YDUAN, Petitioners

DECISION

DEL CASTILLO, J.:

Factual Antecedents

Spouses Juan and herein petitioner Conchita Gloria (Conchita) are registered owners of a parcel of
land located in Kamuning, Quezon City covered by Transfer Certificate of Title. Petitioner Maria
Lourdes Gloria-Payduan (Lourdes) is their daughter.

On August 14, 1987, Juan passed away.

On December 7, 1993, Conchita and Lourdes filed before the RTC a Second Amended
Complaint9 against respondent Builders Savings, Benildo Biag (Biag), and Manuel F. Lorenzo for
"declaration of null and void real estate mortgage, promissory note, cancellation of notation in the
transfer certificate of title, and damages"10 with prayer for injunctive relief. Petitioners claimed that
Biag duped them into surrendering TCT 35814 to him under the pretense that Biag would verify the
title, which he claimed might have been fraudulently transferred to another on account of a fire that
gutted the Quezon City Registry of Deeds; that Biag claimed that the title might need to be
reconstituted; that Biag instead used the title to mortgage the Kamuning property to respondent
Builders Savings; that Conchita was fraudulently made to sign the subject loan and mortgage
documents by Biag, who deceived Conchita into believing that it was actually Lourdes who
requested that these documents be signed; that the subject Mortgage 11 and Promissory
Note12 contained the signature not only of Conchita, but of Juan, who was by then already long
deceased, as mortgagor and co-maker; that at the time the loan and mortgage documents were
supposedly executed, Conchita was already sickly and senile, and could no longer leave her house;
that Biag and Builders Savings conspired in the execution of the forged loan and mortgage
documents; that the forged loan and mortgage documents were not signed/affirmed before a notary
public; that on account of Biag and Builders Savings' collusion, the subject property was foreclosed
and sold at auction to the latter; and that the loan and mortgage documents, as well as the
foreclosure and sale proceedings, were null and void and should he annulled. Petitioners thus
prayed that the Mortgage and Promissory Note be declared null and void; that the
encumbrances/annotations in the subject title be cancelled; that the certificate of title be returned to
them; and that they be awarded ₱500,000.00 moral damages, ₱50,000.00 exemplary damages,
₱20,000.00 actual damages, ₱20,000.00 attorney's fees and other legal expenses, and costs of suit.

On the other hand, Builders Savings claimed that -

xx x Lourdes Payduan had neither the capacity to sue nor the authority and interest to file the case a
quo. She was merely an "ampon" or "palaki" of the Spouses Juan and Conchita Gloria and was not
legally adopted by them. Moreover, Conchita neither signed the verification attached to the
complaint nor executed a special power of attorney to authorize her daughter Maria Lourdes to
pursue the case a quo. Further, Conchita never appeared in court to testify during trial.

1. WHETHER xx x PETITIONER MARIA LOURDES GLORIA-PA YDUAN AS CO-OWNER OF

Our Ruling

The Petition is granted.

The evidence reveals that Lourdes is the daughter of Juan and Conchita. There is on record a
Certification of Birth issued by the Lipa City Office of the Local Civil Registrar indicating that Lourdes
was born to Juan and Conchita; this document was marked as Exhibit "H" during the proceedings
below, and remains uncontested. Moreover, Lourdes categorically testified during trial that she was
the natural child of Juan and Conchita.

Being the daughter of the deceased Juan and Conchita, Lourdes has an interest in the subject
property as heir to Juan and co-owner with Conchita The fact that she was not judicially
declared as heir is of no moment, for, as correctly argued by petitioners, there was no need for a
prior declaration of heirship before heirs may commence an action arising from any right of their
predecessor, such as one for annulment of mortgage. "[N]o judicial declaration of heirship is
necessary in order that an heir may assert his or her right to the property of the deceased."20

x x x. A prior settlement of the estate is not essential before the heirs can commence any action
originally pertaining to the deceased as we explained in Quison v. Salud-

Claro Quison died in 1902. It was proven at the trial that the present plaintiffs are next of kin and
heirs, but it is said by the appellants that they [were] not entitled to maintain this action because
there [was] no evidence that any proceedings [had] been taken in court for the settlement of the
estate of Claro Quison; and that without such settlement, the heirs cannot maintain this action. There
is nothing in this point. [Under) the Civil Code [and/or] Code of Civil Procedure, the title to the
property owned by a person who dies intestate passes at once to his heirs. Such transmission is,
under the present law, subject to the claims of administration and the property may be taken from
the heirs for the pw-pose of paying debts and expenses, but this does not prevent an immediate
passage of the title, upon the death of the intestate, from himself to his heirs. Without some showing
that a judicial administrator had been appointed in proceedings to settle the estate of Claro Quison,
the right of the plaintiffs to maintain this action is established.

Conformably with the ·foregoing and taken in conjunction with Atty. 777 and 494 of the Civil Code,
from the death of Lourdes Sampayo her rights as a co-owner, incidental to which is the right to ask
for partition at any time or to te1minate the co-ownership, were transmitted to her rightful heirs. In so
demanding partition private respondents merely exercised the right originally pe1tai1ling to the
decedent, their predecessor-in-interest.21 (Citations omitted)

As regards the supposed defective verification occasioned by Conchita's failure to sign the amended
complaint with its concomitant verification and certification against forum shopping, the Court has
repeatedly held that in a case involving co-owners of property where said property is the subject
matter of the suit, the failure of the other co-owners to sign the verification and certification against
forum shopping is not fatal, as the signing by only one or some of them constitutes substantial
compliance with the rule.

Finally, we find no merit in respondents' argument that the present petition should be dismissed for
failure of the od1er co-heirs/co-petitioners to sign the verification and certification against forw11-
shopping as required by Sections 4 and 5, Rule 7 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure.
In the case of Iglesia Ni Cristo v. Judge Ponferrada we expounded on the purpose and sufficiency of
compliance with the verification and ce1tification against forum shopping requirements, viz.:

The issue in the present case is not the lack of verification but the sufficiency of one executed by
only one of (the] plaintiffs. This Cou1t held in Ateneo de Naga University v. Manalo, that the
verification requirement is deemed substantially complied with when, as in the present case, only
one of the heirs-plaintiffs, who has sufficient knowledge and belief to swear to the truth of the
allegations in the petition (complaint), signed the verification attached to it. Such verification is
deemed sufficient assurance that the matters alleged in the petition have been made in good faith or
are true and correct, not merely speculative.

The same liberality should likewise be applied to the certification against forum shopping. The
1âwphi 1

general rule is that the certification must be signed by all plaintiffs in a case and the signature of only
one of them is insufficient. However, the Court has also stressed in a number of cases that the rules
on form shopping were designed to promote and facilitate the orderly administration of justice and
thus should not be interpreted with such absolute literalness as to subve1t its own ultin1ate and
legitimate objective. The rule of substantial compliance may be availed of with respect to the
contents of the certification. This is because the requirement of strict compliance with the provisions
merely w1derscores its mandatory nature in that the certification cannot be altogether dispensed
with or its requirements completely disregarded.

The substantial compliance rule has been applied by this Court in a number of cases: Cavile v. Heirs
of Cavile, where the Court sustained the validity of the certification signed by only one of petitioners
because he is a relative of the other petitioners and co-owner of the prope1ties in dispute; Heirs of
Agapito T Olarte v. Office of the President of the Philippines, where the Cou1t allowed a certification
signed by only two petitioners because the case involved a family home in which all the petitioners
shared a common interest; Gudoy v. Guadalquiver, where the Court considered as valid the
ce1tification signed by only four of the nine petitioners because all petitioners filed as co-owners pro
indiviso a complaint against respondents for quieting of title and damages, as such, they all have
joint interest in the undivided whole; and Dar v. Alonzo-Legasto, where the Court sustained the
certification signed by only one of the spouses as they were sued jointly involving a prope1ty in
which they had a common interest.

It is noteworthy that in all of the above cases, the Court applied the rule on substantial compliance
because of the commonality of interest of all the parties with respect to the subject of the
controversy.22(Citations omitted)

"As such co-owners, each of the heirs may properly bring an action for ejectment, forcible entry and
detainer, or any kind of action for the recovery of possession of the subject properties. Thus, a co-
owner may bring such an action, even without joining all the other co-owners as co-plaintiffs,
because the suit is deemed to be instituted for the benefit of all."23

Finally, the Court finds the trial court to be correct in issuing the March 12, 2004 Order granting
petitioners' motion for reconsideration and declaring the mortgage and promissory note as null and
void. The evidence indicates that these documents were indeed simulated; as far as petitioners were
concerned, they merely entrusted the title to the subject property to Biag for the purpose of
reconstituting the same as he claimed that the title on file with the Registrar of Deeds of Quezon City
may have been lost by fire. Petitioners did not intend for Biag to mortgage the subject property in
1991 to secure a loan; yet the latter, without petitioners' knowledge and consent, proceeded to do
just that, and in the process, he falsified the loan and mortgage documents and the accompanying
promissory note by securing Conchita's signatures thereon through fraud and misrepresentation and
taking advantage of her advanced age and naivete and forged Juan's signature and made it appear
that the latter was still alive at the time, when in truth and in fact, he had passed away in 1987. A
Certificate of Death24 issued by the Quezon City Local Civil Registrar and marked as Exhibit "D" and
admitted by the trial court proves this fact. Under the Civil Code,

Art. 1346. An absolutely simulated or fictitious contract is void. x x x

Art. 1409. The following contracts are inexistent and void from the beginning:

(l)xxx;

(2) Those which are absolutely simulated or fictitious;

As a consequence of Biag's fraud and forgery of the loan and mortgage documents, the same were
rendered null and void. This proceeds from the fact that Biag was not the owner of the subject
property and may not thus validly mortgage it, as well as the well-entrenched rule that a forged or
fraudulent deed is a nullity and conveys no title. "In a real estate mo1igage contract, it is essential
that the mortgagor be the absolute owner of the property to be mortgaged; otherwise, the mortgage
is void."26 And "when the instrument presented for registration is forged, even if accompanied by the
owner's duplicate certificate of title, the registered owner does not thereby lose his title, and neither
does the mortgagee acquire any right or title to the property. In such a case, the mortgagee under
the forged instrument is not a mortgagee protected by law."27 Lastly, when "the person applying for
the loan is other than the registered owner of the real property being mortgaged[, it] should have
already raised a red flag and xx x should have induced the [mortgagee] to make inquiries into and
confirm [the authority of the mortgagor]."28

WHEREFORE, the Petition is GRANTED. The assailed March 13, 2012 Decision and June 18, 2012
Resolution of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. CV No. 82774 are ANNULLED and SET ASIDE. The
March 12, 2004 Order of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court, Branch 224 in Civil Case No. Q-90-
16621 is REINSTATED

SO ORDERED.

MARIANO C. DEL CASTILLO