## Facts

- A vendor agreed to sell a dwelling house to two purchasers for £6,000, promising completion with vacant possession.
- Before completion, the vendor’s wife—who refused to leave—registered a Class F land charge protecting statutory matrimonial home occupation rights under the Matrimonial Homes Act 1967.
- The vendor could not secure the wife’s departure and repudiated the contract, making completion with vacant possession impossible.
- The property value increased between breach and judgment (approximately £7,500 at breach and £11,500 by the time of the order).
- The purchasers sought specific performance requiring conveyance with vacant possession, or alternatively damages in lieu under the Chancery Amendment Act 1858 (Lord Cairns’ Act).

## Issues

1. Whether specific performance should be ordered where the vendor could not deliver vacant possession because the vendor’s spouse had enforceable statutory occupation rights.
2. Whether the registered Class F matrimonial home right was inconsistent with (and therefore breached) the contractual obligation to provide vacant possession.
3. If specific performance was refused, whether damages in lieu under Lord Cairns’ Act could be assessed by reference to the property’s value at the date of the court’s order rather than the date of breach.

## Decision

- Specific performance was refused because an order would either (a) force litigation between spouses to remove the wife’s statutory occupation rights or (b) fail to deliver what was contracted for (vacant possession).
- The existence of the registered Class F land charge was treated as inconsistent with the obligation to provide vacant possession, placing the vendor in breach.
- The court awarded damages in lieu of specific performance under Lord Cairns’ Act, assessed to reflect the position the purchasers would have been in had the contract been performed.
- Damages were measured by the difference between the contract price and the value at the date of the order (approximately £5,500, subject to minor adjustments), capturing the post-breach appreciation.

## Legal Principles

- Specific performance is discretionary and may be refused where enforcement would be unreasonable or would effectively require the defendant to litigate against a third party to perform.
- A contractual promise of vacant possession is breached where a spouse’s registered statutory right of occupation prevents delivery of the property free from that occupation.
- Damages awarded “in substitution for” specific performance under Lord Cairns’ Act may depart from common-law breach-date valuation rules and may be assessed as of a later date (including judgment) to reflect what specific performance would have achieved.

## Conclusion

The court declined to compel conveyance where statutory spousal occupation rights prevented vacant possession, but granted damages in lieu under Lord Cairns’ Act assessed at the date of the order so the purchasers received the benefit they would have obtained had the contract been specifically performed.


Wroth v. Tyler, [1974] 1 Ch. 30 (Ch. Div. 1973)