In the case of Hodge v. Garrett 101 Idaho 397, 614.2d 420 (1980), the buyer wished to purchase land located next to the sellers' drive-in movie theater. One seller signed the contract. The testimony was conflicting as to whether the buyer was told that the remaining members of the sellers' partnership would have to agree to the sale. The buyer brought suit when the sellers refused to sell. The trial court found that the one seller, as an agent, bound the sellers' partnership.

Voeller testified that he had told Hodge prior to signing that Hodge would have to present him with a plat plan which would have to be approved by the partners before the property could be sold. Hodge denied that a plat plan had ever been mentioned to him, and he testified that Voeller did not tell him that the approval of the other partners was needed until after the contract was signed. Hodge also testified that he offered to pay Voeller the full purchase price when he signed the contract, but Voeller told him that that was not necessary. The trial court decided that Voeller had actual and apparent power to execute the contract on behalf of the partnership, and that the contract should be enforced. The partners of the Pay-Ont Drive-In Theatre appealed, arguing that Voeller did not have authority to sell the property and that Hodge knew that he did not have such authority.

The court reversed on appeal, finding that the one seller had no authority to make the sale. The seller had no actual authority, and his apparent authority could not extend to matters outside of the ordinary business of a drive-in movie theater. Under Idaho Code 53-309(1), the usual business of the sellers' partnership did not include dealing in real estate. Thus, the contract was unenforceable.

In the case of Konic International...

Spokane Computer Services 109 / Idaho 627-708 P.2d 932 (1985), one of the buyer's representatives spoke to the seller about purchasing a surge protector. The representative had priced units, getting prices from $50 to $200. The seller offered to sell a unit for $5,620, which the representative misinterpreted as $56.20. The representative worked up a purchase order for $56.20, and placed an order with the seller. The unit was installed while the buyer's president was on vacation. When the president returned from vacation, he immediately ordered that power to the equipment be turned off because the surge protector was obviously worth more than $56.20. The president contacted the seller to have them pick up the protector, but the seller refused and brought suit for the purchase price.
Plaintiff seller sought review of the decision of the District Court of the First Judicial District (Idaho), which affirmed the magistrate's decision granting judgment for defendant buyer in the seller's breach of contract lawsuit for the alleged sale of goods. The court affirmed the trial court's decision granting judgment for the buyer. The court held that there was no sales contract because the parties had a material mutual misunderstanding and any agreement that they thought they had reached was merely an illusion.

The court found that there is no expression of mutual assent to an exchange if the parties attach materially different meanings to their ideas and neither knows or has reason to know the meaning that is attached by the other. Even though the parties had apparent mutual assent to the same words of the agreement, there may be no contract because of a material difference of understanding as to the terms of the exchange. When there is a phrase in a contract that is reasonably…