## Facts

- A real-estate mortgage on Nebraska land was executed and recorded in November 1926.
- The mortgage debt matured on November 3, 1929.
- The debt was not paid at maturity; on November 24, 1933, interest through November 3, 1933 was paid.
- No recorded extension, rerecording, or other instrument was filed to show continuation of the mortgage lien beyond the maturity date shown of record.
- In May 1940, Ralph Rumbaugh purchased the land for value.
- The mortgage holder, Emma Dickinson Weekes, sought to enforce the mortgage notwithstanding the time elapsed, relying on the 1933 interest payment to postpone the statute of limitations.
- The trial court treated the mortgage as enforceable against Rumbaugh’s title; Rumbaugh appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether a partial payment of interest made after maturity extends or tolls Nebraska’s 10-year limitations period for mortgage foreclosure as against a subsequent purchaser for value.
2. Whether a subsequent purchaser for value may take title free of an older recorded mortgage when the record shows maturity more than ten years earlier and no recorded extension exists.

## Decision

- The Nebraska Supreme Court reversed the trial court.
- The court held the 1933 interest payment did not extend the 10-year limitations period as against Rumbaugh, a subsequent purchaser for value.
- Because more than ten years had run from the recorded maturity date before Rumbaugh’s 1940 purchase, the mortgage was unenforceable against his title.
- The mortgage could not be foreclosed against the land in Rumbaugh’s hands.

## Legal Principles

- As to subsequent purchasers for value, the limitations period for foreclosing a real-estate mortgage is measured from the maturity date shown on the recorded instrument (or a recorded extension).
- Off-record events between mortgagor and mortgagee, including partial payments of principal or interest, do not postpone the running of the limitations period against subsequent purchasers for value.
- Recording policy protects purchasers who rely on the public record; mortgagees seeking to preserve enforceability against third parties must use recordable instruments rather than private dealings.

## Conclusion

The court held that a later purchaser for value may rely on the public record and the ten-year bar: an unrecorded interest payment after maturity does not keep a mortgage enforceable against the purchaser’s title.


Weekes v. Rumbaugh, 12 N.W.2d 636 (Neb. 1944)