Eastwood v Kenyon brief

Facts: The father of the defendant's wife made a will leaving

everything to his infant daughter. He appointed the plaintiff as
executor. The father later bought another piece of land using
a mortgage and began to build cottages on this land. Before the
cottages were complete, he died. The plaintiff then acted as the
daughter’s guardian and administered the estate on her behalf.
He was not paid for this service. The plaintiff spent a large
amount of money in educating her, completing the cottages
and paying off the mortgage. The estate turned out to be
insufficient, so the plaintiff used some of his own money and
took out a loan. The daughter then came of age. She assented
to the plaintiff’s loan and promised to pay it off. She later
married, and her husband repeated this promise. However,
when the loan became due the couple refused to pay. They
argued that there was no binding contractual agreement
between the parties because the plaintiff had not
provided consideration for their promises to pay.

Issue(s)
1. Had the plaintiff provided sufficient consideration for the
couple’s promises to pay off the loan?

Decision
The Court held against the plaintiff. The plaintiff’s actions
happened before the husband and daughter’s promises, and so
were past consideration. This was not good consideration.
There was therefore no contract.

This Case is Authority For…

Past consideration is not good consideration.