1 The two parties to this dispute (“Parties”) are the claimant, Chan Yip Tong David @ Chan Sow Lang (“Claimant”) and the defendant, Chan Yip Tong Franklin @ Chan Sow Fatt (“Defendant”). Both of them are brothers. Their mother (“Testatrix”) had three other children:

(a) Chan Yip Tong George (“George”);

(b) Chan Yip Tong Jack (“Jack”); and

(c) Chan Sow Chong @ Oliver Peter Yip Tong (“Peter”), who predeceased the Testatrix.

2 In the Testatrix’s last will and testament dated 25 October 2012 (“Will”), ¹ she named the Parties as the executors of her estate (“Estate”). She passed away on 21 December 2012, with grant of probate being issued on 5 April 2014. ² The Will named four beneficiaries: ³ (a) the Claimant; (b) the Defendant; (c) Peter’s daughter, Chan Dione Yiptong (“Dione”); and (d) George’s daughter, Chan Joanne Yiptong (“Joanne”). Notably, George and Jack were not named as beneficiaries even though they were still alive at the time the Will was made. ⁴

3 The Will bequeathed the following three immovable properties to the beneficiaries above: ⁵

(a) A semi-detached house at Eng Kong Road (“EK Property”) was bequeathed to the Parties in equal shares.

(b) A retail unit in Far East Shopping Centre at Orchard Road (“Far East Property”) was bequeathed to the Claimant, Defendant, and Dione in three equal shares.

(c) A condominium unit at Hindhede Walk (“Springdale Condo”) was bequeathed to Dione and Joanne in equal shares.

The EK Property, Far East Property and Springdale Condo were transferred to the respective beneficiaries in accordance with the bequeathments listed above. ⁶

4 By way of background, the EK Property had been purchased in February 2012, while it was still under construction. Thereafter, its purchase price was settled by way of progress payments. These progress payments were ongoing as at the point the Will was executed and continued to be made even after the Testatrix’s death in December 2012, ending only in April 2014. ⁷

5 Apart from the real estate above, the Testatrix had other financial assets, including monies in bank accounts held either by herself or jointly with one or more of her children. In respect of these monies, the Will directed as follows: ⁸

(a) All the Testatrix’s monies – whether in joint or personal bank accounts – were to be applied towards the EK Property’s progress payments, with any balance to be divided equally four ways between the Claimant, the Defendant, Dione, and Joanne.

(b) In the event of the Testatrix’s monies being insufficient to cover the EK Property’s progress payments, any shortfall – which the Parties termed the “EK Shortfall” – was to be met using the net rental proceeds from the Far East Property and the Springdale Condo.

6 The present dispute arises from a multitude of claims that the Parties have levelled against each other. For a more structured analysis, I have classified these claims under the following broad categories.

7 Firstly, both sides have advanced a number of claims in relation to the EK Property, as set out below.

(a) The Claimant claims for rent payable by the Defendant for the period when the Defendant’s family was residing at the EK Property.

(b) The Claimant also claims for his share of the rent which the Defendant collected from the tenant who had subsequently rented the EK Property, one Hau Hoang Jason (“Jason”).

(c) The Defendant, on his part seeks various remedies in relation to the rent collected from Jason, including orders that the Claimant:

(i) release the Defendant’s share of rent paid by Jason, which now sits in a bank account jointly held in the names of the Parties;

(ii) pay the “excess rent” which he collected from Jason; and

(iii) furnish an account of the rent collected from Jason.

(d) The Defendant also wants the Claimant to reimburse him for the property tax which the Defendant claims to have paid for the EK Property.

(e) The Defendant also seeks to compel the Claimant to pay half the commission which the Defendant claims to have earned (in his capacity as a property agent) for procuring Jason’s tenancies.

8 Secondly, the Defendant seeks damages against the Claimant for defamation. This claim pertains to an email which the Claimant had sent to the Defendant’s employer, PropNex Realty Pte Ltd (“PropNex”), concerning Jason’s tenancy.

9 Thirdly, the Claimant seeks to enforce a handwritten note signed by the Defendant on 11 September 2021 (“Handwritten Note”), under which the Parties agreed that $600,000 of the proceeds from selling the EK Property (which was eventually sold in April 2022 ⁹ ) would be set aside and distributed equally to George and Jack.

10 Fourthly, both sides have advanced the following claims in relation to the Far East Property:

(a) The Claimant wants the Defendant to furnish an account of the rent which the latter had collected.

(b) The Defendant wants the Claimant to furnish an account of the maintenance fees and property tax that had been paid.

11 Fifthly, the Defendant wants the Claimant to furnish an account in respect of the following matters relating to the Estate:

(a) the EK Shortfall (as defined at [5(b)] above);

(b) the Testatrix’s investment in a gold investment company called Genneva Pte Ltd, made sometime between 2011 and 2012 (“Gold Investment”); and

(c) A blue attaché case containing valuables belonging to the Testatrix.

12 Next, both sides also want the other party to furnish an account of the balances in various bank accounts in which the Testatrix was a joint account holder, as set out below.

(a) The Claimant wants the Defendant to furnish an account of the following two bank accounts:

(i) a joint account with CIMB Bank Bhd ending with the digits “5045” (“CIMB Joint Account”), held in the names of the Testatrix and the Defendant; and

(ii) a joint account with the Development Bank of Singapore Ltd ending with the digits “7643” (“DBS Joint Account”), held in the names of the Testatrix, the Defendant and his son.

(b) The Defendant wants the Claimant to furnish an account of various joint bank accounts, although these have not been fully particularised in the Defendant’s pleadings.

13 Finally, the Defendant seeks to recover sums which he alleges the Claimant to have withdrawn from a bank account held jointly by the Testatrix and Peter with the Post Office Savings Bank Ltd (“POSB Joint Account”).

14 I now deal with each of these heads of claim, according to the sequence as set out above.

15 As alluded to at [4] above, after the EK Property was purchased in February 2012, its purchase price was settled via progress payments which continued until 2014. The Temporary Occupation Permit (“TOP”) for the EK Property was eventually issued in June 2014, ¹⁰ after which there were two periods when it was occupied:

(a) From around October 2014 onwards, the Defendant and his family moved into the EK Property, where they resided for about two years, up until September 2016. ¹¹ Thereafter, the Defendant’s family moved out, with only the Defendant’s son, Chan Zhaohao, Charles Yiptong (“Charles”) continuing to reside at the EK Property. Charles stayed at the EK Property for only two more months – October and November 2016 ¹² – after which he also moved out. Thereafter, the EK Property remained vacant for about eight months.

(b) In August 2017, the Parties rented the EK Property to Jason. ¹³ After successive tenancies that collectively spanned more than four years, Jason vacated the EK Property sometime in January 2022.

In April 2022, the Parties sold the EK Property, ¹⁴ after having held it as tenants in common for more than nine years.

16 The Claimant claims against the Defendant for rent in respect of the EK Property, in relation to both the periods (a) and (b) in the immediately preceding paragraph. Specifically, the Claimant seeks the following:

(a) Rent payable by the Defendant for the duration when his family (including Charles) resided at the EK Property.

(b) Rent which the Defendant collected from Jason. As the Parties each owned half of the EK Property as tenants in common (see [3(a)] above), ¹⁵ the Claimant claims for half of the rent collected from Jason.

17 The Defendant, on his part, has advanced various counterclaims against the Claimant in respect of the EK Property:

(a) Firstly, the Defendant seeks various remedies relating to the rental proceeds from Jason’s tenancies, as set out at [7(c)] above.

(b) The Defendant also wants the Claimant to reimburse him for the property tax which the Defendant claims to have paid for the EK Property.

(c) Finally, the Defendant claims against the Claimant for the commission which the Defendant claims to have earned, in his capacity as the property agent who procured Jason’s tenancies.

18 I now deal each of these claims in turn.

19 I begin with the Claimant’s claim for rent which he says the Defendant owes in respect of the duration when the latter’s family resided at the EK Property.

20 The Parties agree that they had orally entered into an arrangement ¹⁶ under which the Defendant would pay the Claimant a monthly rent of $4,000 in exchange for the Defendant’s family residing at the EK Property. ¹⁷ While this rent was paid by the Defendant for the months May 2015 to August 2016, the Claimant maintains that the Defendant should also have paid it for: ¹⁸

(a) the prior seven-month period of October 2014 to April 2015; and

(b) the final three months of occupation from September to November 2016.

The Claimant thus alleges that the Defendant owes him a total of ten months’ rent, amounting to $40,000.

21 The Defendant, on his part, claims that he had made a separate oral agreement with the Claimant, sometime on 25 June 2014, under which the Defendant was excused from having to pay rent while staying at the EK Property until the Defendant could secure rental income from his apartment in The Pinnacle @ Duxton (“Pinnacle”). ¹⁹ As it turns out, the Defendant was ultimately unable to rent out Pinnacle but managed to sell it instead, in May 2015. ²⁰ With the sale rendering the notion of renting out Pinnacle moot, the Defendant commenced paying rent for the EK Property from May 2015 onwards. The Defendant thus argues that he was excused from paying rent in respect of the EK Property prior to that, for the months October 2014 to April 2015 (ie, the duration in [20(a)] above), when Pinnacle could not be rented out. In response to this, the Claimant denies that he ever agreed to allow the Defendant to stay on the EK Property rent free. ²¹

22 As for the months of September to November 2016 (at [20(b)] above), the Defendant claims that he and his family had already moved out of the EK Property, with only Charles staying behind in October and November 2016 to oversee post-construction rectification works on the EK Property. ²²

23 Before addressing the Claimant’s claim, I make some preliminary observations on the Parties’ arrangement for the Defendant to pay a monthly rent of $4,000 in exchange for his family residing at the EK Property. As alluded to at [20] above, the Parties agree that they did orally enter into such an arrangement. While a co‑owner in occupation of co‑owned property generally has no liability to pay the other co‑owners any occupation fee or rent, such liability can be agreed upon by the co‑owners: Khoo Jee Chek v Lim Beng Tiong [2024] 1 SLR 829 at [62]. As for whether such an agreement creates a landlord‑tenant relationship between the co‑owners, it has been held that a co-owner of a property cannot validly grant a leasehold interest over that property to another co-owner (see the opinion of F A Chua J in Goodland Ltd v Lim Ban Toon [1965–1967] SLR(R) 264 at [17]). The latter proposition has nevertheless been criticised as being commercially impractical and out of line with Commonwealth authorities (Tang Hang Wu & Kelvin F K Low, Tan Sook Yee’s Principles of Singapore Land Law (LexisNexis, 4th Ed, 2019) at p 214).

24 In any event, neither party goes so far as to suggest that their intention was to confer a leasehold interest on the Defendant, in exchange for him paying the monthly rent of $4,000. While their arrangement contemplated that the Defendant’s family would get exclusive possession for the duration that he paid the monthly rent of $4,000, this is not in itself determinative of whether a leasehold interest was intended to be conferred. The court must ascertain parties’ intentions from all the relevant circumstances, looking at their conduct and the substance of the agreement between them: Goh Gin Chye v Peck Teck Kian Realty Pte Ltd [1987] SLR(R) 195 at [14]–[15], citing Street v Mountford [1985] 1 AC 809 (“Street”) at 818. Some insights into what the Parties intended in this case can be gleaned from a WhatsApp message sent by the Defendant to the Claimant on 30 October 2014 at 12.04am, ²³ extracted below:

The message above does not suggest any intention by the Parties for the arrangement (by which the Defendant paid a monthly rent of $4,000) to confer any interest in the EK Property on the Defendant, over and above what he already owned (see Street at 824–825, citing Marchant v Charters [1977] 1 WLR 1181 at 1185). In fact, one can tell from the message that the arrangement was a highly fluid one, where the Parties did not even see fit to specify the duration for which this arrangement would subsist.

25 As such, rather than conferring upon the Defendant any additional interest in the EK Property, the arrangement between the Parties appeared to be more consistent with a contract by which the Claimant merely undertook a personal obligation to stay out of the property, for the duration that the Defendant paid rent. Notwithstanding, the Defendant relies on s 6(d) of the Civil Law Act 1909 (2020 Rev Ed) (“CLA”) to contend that the arrangement for him to pay a monthly rent of $4,000, not having been reduced into writing, was unenforceable. ²⁴ This provision states:

Specifically, the Defendant argues that as there was no “memorandum or note” signed by him evincing the arrangement where he would pay a monthly rent of $4,000 in exchange for his family being allowed to reside at the EK Property, s 6(d) CLA dictates that the Claimant “has no action to bring against the Defendant in respect of the alleged rent”. ²⁵

26 This defence is clearly a non-starter. As seen from the extract above, s 6(d) CLA is concerned with “any contract for the sale or other disposition of immovable property, or any interest in such property” [emphasis added]. As the arrangement for the Defendant to stay on the EK Property was merely a contract embodying a personal obligation by the Claimant that did not entail the disposition of any interest in the EK Property (see [25] above), s 6(d) CLA has no relevance here.

27 In any case, the Defendant should not be allowed to raise s 6(d) CLA now as the provision was never pleaded by him, despite his Defence and Counterclaim having been amended four times. Section 6(d) CLA was raised by him for the very first time only in closing submissions. Guidance may be taken from the case of Midlink Development Pte Ltd v The Stansfield Group Pte Ltd [2004] 4 SLR(R) 258, where the defendant also sought to rely on s 6(d) CLA despite not having pleaded it. V K Rajah JC (as he then was) observed (at [64]):

Indeed, there is even greater cause to bar the Defendant from relying on s 6(d) CLA here, given that this is not just a case of his pleading failing to raise s 6(d) CLA. His pleadings actually admitted that there was an agreement for him to pay $4,000 rent every month. ²⁶

28 Notwithstanding his failure to plead s 6(d) CLA, the Defendant submits that the court should take “judicial notice” of this provision. ²⁷ In making this submission, he relies on s 59(1)(a) of the Evidence Act 1893 (2020 Rev Ed) (“EA”), which states:

With respect, the Defendant’s submission is misconceived. When the court takes judicial notice of a fact, this simply means that the fact is taken to be uncontroversial or beyond reasonable dispute, such that it need not be proved: Caesarstone Sdot-Yam Ltd v Ceramiche Caesar SpA [2016] 2 SLR 1129 at [38]; see also s 58 EA. That does not relieve the Defendant from his obligation to plead his defence so that the Claimant is not taken by surprise.

29 Having set out my views on the preliminary matters above, I now turn to consider the substantive arguments underlying the Claimant’s claim for rent payable by the Defendant. To recapitulate, the Claimant is claiming for monthly rent of $4,000, in respect of the following months when the Defendant’s family resided at the EK Property (set out at [20] above):

(a) October 2014 to April 2015; and

(b) September to November 2016.

For the reasons below, I dismiss the Claimant’s claim in (a) and allow his claim in (b).

30 Given that the Parties do not dispute that there was an arrangement between them for the Defendant’s family to stay at the EK Property in exchange for a monthly rent of $4,000, the starting position is that the Defendant was liable to pay that rent once his family commenced their stay in October 2014. The Defendant nevertheless contends that he had a separate oral agreement with the Claimant excusing the Defendant from paying rent – despite his family residing at the EK Property – pending the Defendant’s attempts to rent out Pinnacle: see [21] above.

31 As it is the Defendant asserting the existence of this separate oral agreement absolving him from paying rent, he bears the burden of proving it. The first port of call when faced with claims that an oral agreement had been struck would be the relevant documentary evidence. In OCBC Capital Investment Asia Ltd v Wong Hua Choon [2012] 4 SLR 1206, the Court of Appeal explained (at [41]):

32 The documentary evidence, including any written correspondence between the parties to the purported oral contract, needs then to be viewed against their contemporaneous conduct at the material time: Tribune Investment Trust Inc v Soosan Trading Co Ltd [2000] 2 SLR(R) 407 at [39]. If there is a dearth of documentary evidence, the court will examine the precise factual matrix to ascertain if the alleged oral agreement had indeed been concluded between parties: Gay Choon Ing v Loh Sze Ti Terence Peter [2009] 2 SLR(R) 332 (“Gay Choon Ing”) at [60].

33 Based on evidence of the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties, I find that they did have an oral agreement to waive the rental payable by the Defendant, at least until he managed to rent out Pinnacle. The most illuminating messages were those exchanged on 23 June 2015, shortly after the Defendant had sold Pinnacle and commenced paying the monthly rent of $4,000 to the Claimant (see [21] above). I extract the salient messages in the table below: ²⁸

34 From the extracts above, one sees that the Defendant’s messages had repeatedly alluded to an agreement excusing him from paying rent, so long as Pinnacle had yet to be rented out. In responding to these messages, the Claimant did not disagree with the Defendant and instead complained that the waiver of rent arose from “a lopsided agreement” entered into “out of brotherhood” (message at 11.34am above). When the Defendant queried the Claimant as to why the latter acceded to the rental waiver if it was unfair, thereby lulling the Defendant into incurring the costs of moving into the EK Property and renovating the same (message at 1.05pm above), the Claimant responded that the Defendant always had reasons to outsmart others (message at 2.54pm above).

35 The Parties continued to exchange messages touching on this topic, as late as two years after the Defendant’s family had vacated the EK Property. In a WhatsApp group chat dated 27 September 2018 between the Parties and their uncle, Tam Sook, the latter had voiced his disappointment over how the Parties were still fighting despite his efforts to mediate. In response, the Claimant sent the following message at 10.19pm: ²⁹

The Claimant thus admitted in this message that he “didn’t argue” with the arrangement of allowing the Defendant to stay at the EK Property rent free (pending Pinnacle being rented out) despite the Claimant feeling that this was unfair, as the Claimant valued their brotherly ties.

36 Despite the trail of messages corroborating the Defendant’s claim that there was an oral agreement allowing him to stay rent free, the Claimant insisted while under cross-examination that he did not agree to excusing the Defendant from paying rent during the latter’s stay at the EK Property. ³⁰ However, the Claimant was simply unable to explain the WhatsApp messages above, which clearly show that he did agree. ³¹

37 Admittedly, the Defendant’s claim that there was an oral agreement – allowing him and his family to stay at the EK Property rent free (pending Pinnacle being rented out) – was not entirely free of difficulty. In court, the Defendant explained that this oral agreement was concluded at a coffee shop in Toa Payoh, immediately after he and the Claimant had collected the keys to the EK property from the conveyancing lawyer’s Toa Payoh office, on 25 June 2014. ³² However, the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties show that four weeks after that, ie, on 22 July 2014, ³³ the Claimant was still inquiring if the Defendant had collected the keys to the EK Property. ³⁴ There would have been little reason for the Claimant to make such an inquiry on 22 July 2014 if the Parties had indeed gone to the lawyer’s Toa Payoh office just four weeks before that (ie, on 25 June 2014) to collect the keys to the EK Property. ³⁵ If the Defendant’s account of how the Parties had collected the keys at the Toa Payoh office on 25 June 2014 is in doubt, this could potentially also cast doubt on his account that they met at the Toa Payoh coffee shop after collecting the keys, where the oral agreement (to let the Defendant stay rent free) was allegedly struck. Under cross-examination, the Defendant was unable to satisfactorily explain the disjoint between his oral evidence and the Claimant’s WhatsApp message on 22 July 2014. ³⁶

38 Nevertheless, I find this to be insufficient to cause any material damage to the veracity of the Defendant’s account. The WhatsApp messages at [33] above are sufficiently probative that the oral agreement – to let the Defendant stay rent free at the EK Property – was indeed struck. I am prepared to grant the Defendant some latitude for any difficulties in recalling the exact circumstances under which the oral agreement came into being (eg, whether it was struck at the point when he collected the keys to the EK Property), given that the event took place some 10 years before the trial.

39 The Claimant also points to the WhatsApp exchange on 30 October 2014 (when the Defendant’s family had just moved into the EK Property), where the Parties recorded their agreement that the Defendant would pay a monthly rent of $4,000 in exchange for his family residing at the EK Property (see [24] above). ³⁷ The Claimant highlights that there was nothing in that WhatsApp exchange suggesting that the Defendant’s obligation to pay that rent would be suspended pending his attempts to rent out Pinnacle. The Claimant questions why the Parties would even be tying down the quantum of the monthly rent if the Defendant had indeed been excused from paying rent at that point in time (Pinnacle having yet to be rented out). ³⁸ In my view, little turns on this. The exchange of WhatsApp messages was consistent with a discussion between the Parties as to the rent that the Defendant would eventually have to pay, once his obligation to pay rent commenced. There was nothing in the WhatsApp exchange to suggest that the $4,000 was going to be immediately payable.

40 The Claimant also points to the chronology of events annexed to the Defendant’s Opening Statement, which states that the oral agreement was for the Defendant’s family to stay in the EK Property rent free until Pinnacle was sold. ³⁹ This conflicts with the position in the main body of the Defendant’s Opening Statement, which is that the arrangement was for his family to stay rent free until Pinnacle was rented out. ⁴⁰ The Claimant thus argues that the Defendant is unable to even give a consistent account of the terms of the alleged oral agreement to let him stay rent free. ⁴¹ In my view, this inconsistency is quite minor in the greater scheme of things. The position that has consistently been advocated by the Defendant – throughout his pleadings, affidavit of evidence-in-chief (“AEIC”) and oral evidence – is that his family was allowed to stay at the EK Property rent free until Pinnacle was rented out. It was only in the chronology, which was appended as an annex to the Opening Statement, that the term “sold” was used instead of “rented out”. The Defendant has clarified on the stand that the chronology was erroneous in this regard. ⁴²

41 I thus find that on balance, the Claimant did agree – albeit resentfully – to let the Defendant stay on the EK Property rent free until Pinnacle was rented out. The Defendant was thus not obliged to pay the monthly rent of $4,000, as from the time his family moved into the EK Property in October 2014 to the point when Pinnacle was sold in May 2015 (when the notion of renting out Pinnacle became moot). I thus dismiss the Claimant’s claim for monthly rent of $4,000 for the months of October 2014 to April 2015, set out at [20(a)] above.

42 I now turn to the period spanning September to November 2016, referred to at [20(b)] above, being the last three months before the Defendant and all his family members fully vacated the EK Property.

43 I begin with the month of September 2016. The Defendant admits that his family did continue to reside at the EK Property until the end of September 2016 ⁴³ and that he was consequently obliged to pay the Claimant rent for that month (Pinnacle having already been sold long before then). Indeed, the Defendant contends that he did pay the rent of $4,000 for the month of September 2016. ⁴⁴ The Claimant maintains that he did not. ⁴⁵

44 On this, the law is clear. If a party who has an undisputed contractual obligation to make a payment pleads that did make that payment, the burden is on him to prove that the payment was in fact made: SCT Technologies Pte Ltd v Western Copper Co Ltd [2016] 1 SLR 1471 at [23]–[31]. On the evidence, the Defendant has plainly failed to discharge that burden. All he needed to do was adduce his financial records to show that the monthly rent of $4,000 for September 2016 was indeed transferred to the Claimant. Rather than doing so, he chose to simply fold his arms and insist that the Claimant proves a negative (ie, that the Claimant did not receive payment). The Claimant’s claim for the rent of $4,000 payable for the month of September 2016 must thus be granted.

45 As regards the rent for October and November 2016, the Defendant claims that his family was no longer residing at the EK Property, save for his son Charles, who stayed on for these final two months to oversee rectification works (see [22] above). According to Charles, he was the only person residing at the EK Property then – the rest of the family having moved out. ⁴⁶

46 Even if I accept Charles’ explanation that he remained at the EK Property in October and November 2016 to oversee rectification works, this does nothing to alter the Defendant’s obligation to pay rent for those two months. The Defendant claims that there was “a whole myriad of defects from the EK Property that would require further rectification works”. ⁴⁷ However, in making that assertion, the Defendant relies on a property defects list dated 14 July 2014, ⁴⁸ ie, about three months before the Defendant and his family had even moved into the EK Property (they moved in only in October 2014). After September 2016, when the Defendant’s family finally vacated and left Charles behind, they would have resided at the EK Property for about two years. Presumably, the bulk of the rectification works would have been completed by the end (if not before commencement) of the family’s stay. ⁴⁹ Notwithstanding that such works would have been carried out under the watch of the Defendant’s family members during their stay, the Parties evidently did not view this as absolving the Defendant from paying rent (once Pinnacle was sold). That being the case, I fail to see how Charles’ purpose of staying behind in October and November 2016 to supervise rectification works (if any was even left) absolves the Defendant from paying rent for his son’s stay for these two final months.

47 The Defendant also contends that he had to personally reside at the EK Property, in order for him to be liable for rent. Given that the Defendant was no longer residing at the EK Property in October and November 2016 (when only Charles stayed there), he argues that he had no obligation to pay rent for those two months. In support of this contention, the Defendant highlights a portion of the trial transcripts where the following question was posed to the Claimant in cross-examination: ⁵⁰

The Defendant relies on the Claimant’s answer “No” in the extract above to submit that the Claimant himself agrees that so long as the Defendant is no longer personally residing at the EK Property (which was the case in October and November 2016), the obligation to pay rent would cease ⁵¹ (notwithstanding that Charles may have remained). However, this submission plainly mischaracterises the evidence. The question posed to the Claimant in the extract above was: “If [the Defendant] was not staying there, would he be liable to rent to you?” and not “would he be liable to pay rent to you?” It is unacceptable for the Defendant to recast the question on record into one that supports his submission. In any case, his submission entirely sidesteps the critical exchange which came immediately after that extracted above, which I set out below: ⁵²

48 The Claimant’s response, extracted immediately above, accords with what I understand from the evidence to be the arrangement between the Parties, being that rent was payable for the Defendant’s family (and not just the Defendant personally) residing at the EK Property. As a matter of common sense, that must be correct. Taking the Defendant’s contention to its logical conclusion would mean that his entire family could remain on the EK Property indefinitely and he would still not be liable for rent, so long as he himself was not there. I fail to see how the Parties could have intended such a ludicrous outcome.

49 Accordingly, I hold that the Defendant is liable to pay the Claimant rent for the months September to November 2016, totalling $12,000.

50 I now turn to address the claims concerning the rental proceeds from Jason’s tenancy of the EK Property.

51 After the Defendant’s family had moved out, the EK Property remained vacant for about eight months before it was tenanted to Jason in August 2017. Jason had rented the EK Property over three consecutive tenancy agreements that collectively spanned a duration of more than four years:

(a) The first tenancy was embodied in an agreement (“1st Tenancy Agreement”) signed in August 2017 by Jason and both the Parties. ⁵³ The 1st Tenancy Agreement was for a term of two years commencing 25 August 2017.

(b) The second tenancy was encapsulated in an addendum to the 1st Tenancy Agreement (“2nd Tenancy Agreement”), signed in August 2019 ⁵⁴ by Jason and the Defendant but not the Claimant. The 2nd Tenancy Agreement extended the lease under the 1st Tenancy Agreement by a further two-year term, commencing 25 August 2019.

(c) The third tenancy was pursuant to an oral agreement (“3rd Tenancy Agreement”) struck in August 2021 between Jason and the Defendant, where both of them agreed to a short extension of the lease, from September 2021 to March 2022.

All three tenancy agreements above were for a monthly rent of $7,800.

52 Under the 1st Tenancy Agreement, Jason was required to pay a security deposit of two months’ rent (ie, $15,600), ⁵⁵ which he duly handed to the Defendant. ⁵⁶ Thereafter, the rent from Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement was paid into an account with Standard Chartered Bank (Singapore) Ltd ending with the digits “3344” (“SCB Joint Account”), held in the joint names of the Parties. ⁵⁷ The Claimant pleaded, and the Defendant admitted, that the rent paid into the SCB Joint Account amounted to a total of $142,971.04 ⁵⁸ – comprising rent collected under the 1st Tenancy Agreement for the months of August 2017 to July 2019 (save for August and September 2018, for which Jason paid the rent to the Parties directly ⁵⁹ ).

53 When the 1st Tenancy Agreement was about to expire in August 2019, the Defendant sought to extend Jason’s tenancy, as he felt that the rent paid by Jason was above the market rate. ⁶⁰ The Defendant consequently prepared the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, being an addendum to the 1st Tenancy Agreement that extended the lease for another two years (ie, from 25 August 2019 to 24 August 2021), at the same monthly rent of $7,800. On 7 August 2019, the Defendant and Jason signed the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. The Claimant refused to sign the same ⁶¹ but the Defendant still proceeded with the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. Upon signing the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, Jason decided to use the two-month security deposit which he had paid the Defendant under the 1st Tenancy Agreement to offset the rent for the first two months of the lease under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, ⁶² ie, August and September 2019. In effect, this meant that there was no security deposit covering Jason’s obligations under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. For the rest of the term under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, Jason split the monthly rent into two equal portions of $3,900, which he separately deposited into the personal bank accounts of both the Parties every month. ⁶³ The Claimant did not object to receiving the same, despite his refusal to sign the 2nd Tenancy Agreement.

54 When the 2nd Tenancy Agreement expired in August 2021, Jason and the Defendant entered into the 3rd Tenancy Agreement, under which they orally agreed to a short extension of the lease for six months, from September 2021 to March 2022. ⁶⁴ However, Jason moved out of the EK Property sometime in January or February 2022. Under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement, Jason paid the full amount of each month’s rent to the Defendant (instead of separately paying half the monthly rent to the Claimant, as he did under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement). In doing so, Jason had left it to the Defendant to split the rent with the Claimant. ⁶⁵ However, the Defendant retained the entire amount of rent collected under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement, without handing half of the same to the Claimant. ⁶⁶

55 Arising from Jason’s tenancies, the Parties make the following claims:

(a) The Claimant claims for his half share of the rent paid by Jason, for the first two months of the lease under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement as well as for the entire period spanning September 2021 to January 2022 when Jason was in occupation under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement.

(b) The Defendant counterclaims against the Claimant for:

(i) An order that the Claimant releases to the Defendant the latter’s half share of the $142,971.04 which currently sits in the SCB Joint Account (see [52] above), which comprises the rent paid by Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement;

(ii) Payment of “excess rent” of $74,880 which the Claimant collected from Jason; and

(iii) An account to be furnished by the Claimant in respect of the rent collected from Jason’s tenancies.

56 Each of these claims is considered in turn below.

57 The Claimant claims for the following amounts of rent which the Defendant had collected from Jason:

(a) $7,800, being the Claimant’s half share of the first two months of rent under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement.

(b) $19,500, being the Claimant’s half share of the rent that Jason paid from September 2021 to January 2022 (totalling $39,000) under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement. ⁶⁷

For the reasons below, I allow the Claimant’s claims in both (a) and (b) above.

58 As explained at [53] above, Jason used his security deposit to settle the first two months of rent payable under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, ie, August and September 2019. As the security deposit now represents the first two months of rent under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, this effectively means that the rent for these two months lies in the Defendant’s coffers. The Claimant claims half of that amount, on the basis that he is entitled to half of all the rent generated by the EK Property. ⁶⁸

59 The Claimant’s claim for his half share of rent is grounded in s 73A of the Conveyancing and Law of Property Act 1886 (2020 Rev Ed) (“CLPA”), which states that a “tenant in common shall be liable to account to his co-owner for receiving more than his share or proportion of any rents or profits arising from the property.” Given that the Parties were tenants in common of the EK Property in equal shares (see [3(a)] above), the Defendant is liable to account to the Claimant for the rent collected from Jason. The Claimant’s entitlement to an account, which arises by virtue of s 73A CLPA, is not in any way diminished by the fact that he did not actually sign the 2nd Tenancy Agreement (see [53] above). This is because s 73A CLPA imposes a mandatory statutory obligation, providing co‑owners with a remedy against their fellow co‑owners for rental income from co‑owned property where there would otherwise be none: Aw Chee Peng v Aw Chee Loo [2022] 5 SLR 451 at [27]–[31]; Salaya Kalairani v Appangam Govindhasamy [2023] SGHC(A) 40 at [79].

60 Accordingly, I order the Defendant to pay the Claimant $7,800, being the latter’s half share of the security deposit that was used by Jason to pay the rent for the months of August and September 2019.

61 Unlike in the case of the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, where Jason separately paid half of each month’s rent to the Claimant (see [53] above), the rent under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement – collected for the months of September 2021 to January 2022 and totalling $39,000 – was paid entirely to the Defendant. As the Claimant has not been given his half share of the $39,000, the Defendant is liable under s 73A CLPA to account to him for the same.

62 Accordingly, I order the Defendant to pay the Claimant $19,500, being his half share of the rent under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement. In doing so, I note that the Defendant himself admits that this sum is due to the Claimant. ⁶⁹

63 This is also an appropriate juncture to highlight the Defendant’s allegation that he had previously offered to pay the Claimant the latter’s half share of the rent under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement but the Claimant refused. ⁷⁰ According to the Defendant, sometime on or around 3 November 2021 (ie, about two months after the 3rd Tenancy Agreement’s term had commenced), the Claimant turned up at the EK Property to harass Jason. The Defendant, who was present, tried to defuse the situation by offering to pay the Claimant the rental proceeds under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement but the latter refused. ⁷¹ In the Claimant’s cross-examination, an extract of which is set out below, the Claimant admitted that the Defendant did make this offer to him: ⁷²

64 I have some sympathy for the Defendant’s position that the Claimant had little reason to refuse the Defendant’s offer to pay him the rental proceeds from the 3rd Tenancy Agreement. As seen from the extract above, the Claimant objected to the offer because the Defendant was proposing to fund the payment from the SCB Joint Account. However, it is hard to see why this was objectionable. As at that point in time (3 November 2021), the SCB Joint Account would have contained the rental proceeds of $142,971.04 collected under the 1st Tenancy Agreement (see [52] above). The Defendant’s half share of this balance would have more than sufficed to cover the Claimant’s half share of the rental proceeds under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement. The Defendant consequently intends to make submissions on costs as regards this point. ⁷³

65 As explained at [52] above, the rent paid by Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement (amounting to $142,971.04) now sits in the SCB Joint Account, which is a bank account jointly held in the names of the Parties. ⁷⁴ Neither of the Parties can withdraw monies from the SCB Joint Account without the consent of the other because the account’s terms dictate that withdrawals may be made only with the signatures of both the Parties. ⁷⁵

66 Given the Defendant’s inability to withdraw his share of the funds in the SCB Joint Account without the Claimant’s consent, the Defendant seeks:

(a) an order compelling the Claimant to release the Defendant’s half share of the $142,971.04 from the SCB Joint Account; ⁷⁶ and

(b) pre-judgment interest arising from the Claimant’s wrongful refusal to release to the Defendant the latter’s half share of the funds in the SCB Joint Account. ⁷⁷

67 There is no dispute that the Defendant is entitled to half the rental proceeds from the EK Property. The Claimant states plainly in his closing submissions that “it is common ground the monies held in the [SCB Joint] Account consisting of rental collected from [the EK Property] belong equally to the Claimant and [the] Defendant”. ⁷⁸ The Claimant has also not sought to plead a right of set-off or any other cause of action, against which the Defendant’s entitlement may be extinguished. I thus see no grounds to stop the Defendant from accessing his half share of the rental proceeds from the 1st Tenancy Agreement, which now sits in the SCB Joint Account.

68 Accordingly, I grant an order that the Parties take the necessary steps to withdraw the $142,971.04 from the SCB Joint Account and divide the same between themselves equally. Apart from the $142,971.04, the SCB Joint Account also contains another $600,000 (see [147] below for the background to this). Any interest earned from the bank in respect of both these amounts and paid by the bank into the SCB Joint Account is similarly to be withdrawn and divided equally between the Parties.

69 I also decline to award the Defendant any pre-judgment interest, arising from the Claimant’s failure to release the Defendant’s half share of the $142,971.04. The Defendant has not offered any particulars as to the rate of interest which the sums in the SCB Joint Account have been earning from the bank and, more pertinently, justify why he should be awarded further interest over and above those interest earnings. Furthermore, the Defendant has failed to specify exactly when he demanded for the Claimant to release his half share of the $142,971.04. That date is critical, because it is the starting point from which his claim for interest is to be calculated.

70 The Defendant also claims against the Claimant for “excess rent” of $74,880 which he alleges that the Claimant had collected from Jason. ⁷⁹ This claim hinges on cl 1 of the 1st Tenancy Agreement, ⁸⁰ which set out the monthly rent of $7,800. Critically, cl 1 stipulated that the $7,800 was to be apportioned as follows:

(a) $4,680 for “rental”; and

(b) $3,120 for “furniture, fixtures & fittings”.

A fuller extract of cl 1 is set out below: ⁸¹

71 Building on the manner in which cl 1 had apportioned the monthly rent, the Defendant constructed his case on “excess rent” as follows:

(a) It was the Defendant, and not the Claimant, who bore the expenses of the EK Property’s “furniture, fixtures & fittings”. ⁸² Accordingly, the Claimant’s half share of the rent should exclude the component of the monthly rent apportioned for “furniture, fixtures & fittings” (ie, $3,120) and be restricted only to the component apportioned for “rental” (ie, $4,680).

(b) This means that the Claimant should only have received $2,340 each month (ie, half of $4,680) and not $3,900 (being half of $7,800). ⁸³ The Claimant had thus improperly reaped “excess rent” of $1,560 (ie, $3,900 minus $2,340) every month.

(c) Having collected such “excess rent” for four years (ie, two years under the 1st Tenancy Agreement and another two years under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement), the total excess rent collected by the Claimant was $74,880 ⁸⁴ (ie, $1,560 per month multiplied by 48 months).

As seen from the calculations in (c) above, the Defendant’s claim for “excess rent” applies not only to the rent under the 1st Tenancy Agreement but to that under the 2nd Tenancy Agreements as well. This is notwithstanding that the clause apportioning the monthly rent into two components is found only in 1st Tenancy Agreement (ie, cl 1, extracted at [70] above) and not expressly reproduced in the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. While the Defendant has not directly addressed this point, I assume that he is relying on the following clause in the 2nd Tenancy Agreement: ⁸⁵

as a means of importing cl 1 from the 1st Tenancy Agreement into the 2nd Tenancy Agreement.

72 For the reasons below, I dismiss the Defendant’s claim for “excess rent”.

73 By way of context, the Claimant has explained that it was the Defendant who came up with the idea of apportioning the rent paid by Jason into a “rental” component and a “furniture, fixtures & fittings” component, as a means of reducing the tax payable on the rental proceeds. I accept this, in light of the evidence of WhatsApp messages from the Defendant to that effect. ⁸⁶ Critically, there is nothing in these messages or in any other evidence of the Parties’ communications to show that they ever agreed to restrict the Claimant’s half share of the rent from the EK Property – which he is statutorily entitled to under s 73 CLPA (see [59] above) – to only the “rental” component of the monthly rent. Certainly, no such intention can be gleaned from a plain reading of the 1st Tenancy Agreement, whose clauses govern the legal relationship between the Parties (as landlords) on the one part and Jason (as tenant) on the other, with no mention whatsoever of how the monthly rent was to be dealt with as between the two landlords.

74 In any case, the Defendant has admitted under cross-examination that there was no agreement between him and the Claimant for the latter’s share of the rent to be restricted to just the “rental” component of the monthly rent of $7,800 (as opposed to a half share of the full amount of $7,800), conceding that both landlords were entitled to the full rent of $7,800. ⁸⁷

75 Furthermore, the Defendant’s attempt to exclude the Claimant from the “furniture, fixtures & fittings” component of the monthly rent is not adequately supported by the evidence. As the Defendant is the party seeking to deduct $74,880 from the Claimant’s share of the rental proceeds, the burden lies on the Defendant to prove that such a deduction is indeed in order.

76 I am mindful of the Claimant’s concession that he did not incur any expenses for the EK Property’s “furniture, fixtures & fittings”. He had even agreed with the suggestion posed to him in cross-examination that it must then have been the Defendant who incurred those expenses. ⁸⁸ However, that concession does not carry the Defendant’s case very far, given the dearth of evidence as to exactly what “furniture, fixtures & fittings” were within the EK Property. Such evidence would have allowed the court to assess if the expenses incurred on these items (if they were indeed incurred by the Defendant) approached the order of $74,880, which the Defendant now seeks to deduct as “excess rent”. Unfortunately, there is no inventory of “furniture, fixtures & fittings” to speak of, notwithstanding that cl 1 of the 1st Tenancy Agreement (extracted at [70] above) specifically alluded to “furniture, fixtures and other effects therein … as more fully described in the Inventory List attached” [emphasis added]. While Jason testified that the EK Property had a dining table, a coffee table, a small glass cabinet and possibly some bed frames, ⁸⁹ the Defendant has not explained the provenance of these items and, more importantly, shown how their cost could add up to $74,880.

77 Apart from the furniture, the Defendant contends that he bore the costs of the refurbishment, renovation and upkeep of the EK Property, including pre‑handover renovations sought by Jason. The Defendant lists the following expenses which he claims to have incurred:

(a) Nearly $60,000 on renovation and refurbishment; ⁹⁰ and

(b) $8,535.50 on various upkeep expenses (eg, installation of swimming pool lights and artificial grass, lift maintenance and curtain dry cleaning). ⁹¹

The Defendant claims that the Claimant – who owns half the EK Property – was liable to bear half of these expenses ⁹² but failed to do so. ⁹³

78 In my view, these purported expenses fail to support the Defendant’s claim for “excess rent”. As regards the $60,000 allegedly spent on renovation and refurbishment, the Defendant has not adduced any documentary proof to show that expenditures amounting to this sum had indeed been incurred. In fact, the Defendant affirmed in the following portion of his AEIC that he could not recall if he received any invoices for the renovation and refurbishment works: ⁹⁴

79 At a broader level, it is trite that where expenses for improvements or repairs to a property have been voluntarily incurred by one of its tenants in common, the other tenants in common who were in no position to reject those improvements or repairs should not be made to contribute towards those expenses: Chia Kok Weng v Chia Kwok Yeo [2017] 2 SLR 964 (“Chia Kok Weng”) at [74] (citing Leigh v Dickeson (1884) 15 QBD 60). In the present case, the Claimant affirms that he never agreed to the renovation, refurbishment and upkeep expenses which the Defendant now seeks to get him to share in. The Claimant’s averment is consistent with the evidence, which contains no hint of him ever having agreed to the expenses for renovation, refurbishment and upkeep of the EK Property. Rather, the Claimant suggests that these expenses were unilaterally incurred by the Defendant for the benefit of the latter’s own family ⁹⁵ as they wanted to move into the EK Property. I note that this suggestion is consistent with the messages exchanged between the Parties on 23 June 2015, ie, about eight months after the Defendant’s family had moved into the EK Property. In that exchange, the Complaint was bemoaning the lopsidedness of the agreement by which the Defendant had been allowed to stay in the EK Property rent free, pending Pinnacle being rented out. To this, the Defendant retorted with the following message (exhibited at [33] above, at 1.05pm):

The emphasised portion of the Defendant’s message strongly suggests that the lion’s share of the costs incurred by him in improving the EK Property was for his own benefit, ie, to facilitate his family’s stay.

80 The Defendant highlights that the court in Chia Kok Weng contemplated that the remedy of equitable accounting may nevertheless be available if the tenant in common concerned had incurred expenses which enhanced the property’s value (Chia Kok Weng at [76]–[77]). In this respect, the Defendant claims that the $8,535.50 spent on (inter alia) the installation of swimming pool lights and artificial grass (see [77(b)] above) served to improve the EK Property’s value. ⁹⁶ However, I fail to see the relevance of this submission. The remedy of equitable accounting is not at issue in this case – it was never a remedy sought by the Defendant. In any event, no evidence was led as to the monetary impact that these expenditures had on the EK Property’s sale price.

81 Consequently, the Defendant’s claim that $74,880 of the rental proceeds constituted “excess rent” collected by the Claimant is baseless.

82 The Defendant also seeks an account from the Claimant of the rent collected from Jason’s tenancies. ⁹⁷ In my view, this claim can be summarily dismissed.

83 As alluded to at [59] above, s 73A CLPA requires a tenant in common to account to his co-owner “for receiving more than his share or proportion of any rents or profits arising from the property” [emphasis added]. The evidence in this case is clear that the Claimant has not received anything more than his rightful share of the rent from the EK Property, meaning that there is nothing collected from Jason which the Claimant needs to account for:

(a) For the 1st Tenancy Agreement, the rent collected from Jason has been paid into the SCB Joint Account (see [52] above).

(b) As for the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, the rent was paid by Jason to the Parties equally (see [53] above), save for the first two months of rent (which were settled using the security deposit – see [58] above), which the Defendant still holds.

(c) As regards the 3rd Tenancy Agreement, all the rent collected from Jason currently lies in the Defendant’s coffers (see [54] above).

84 The Defendant’s claim for the Claimant to furnish an account of the rent collected from Jason is thus devoid of merit.

85 The Defendant also contends that he had paid $13,420.50 in property tax for the EK Property, for the duration commencing from the issue of the TOP in June 2014 to when Jason first moved in at the end 2017. ⁹⁸ He now claims that the Claimant, as a tenant in common of the EK Property, should be made to pay half of the $13,420.50 or even all of it. ⁹⁹ In support of the latter position that the Claimant could even be held liable for all of the $13,420.50, the Defendant highlights that the property tax figure was based on a concessionary 6% owner-occupied rate (as opposed to the regular 14%) and this was thanks to the Defendant and his family residing in the EK Property at the material time. ¹⁰⁰

86 The Claimant, on his part, explains that he was always willing to pay his share of the property tax for the EK Property but the Defendant did not give him copies of the property tax statements. ¹⁰¹

87 In my view, the Defendant’s claim for the Claimant to reimburse him for the purported property tax payment of $13,420.50 should be dismissed. I am of course aware that the Claimant conceded that he did not pay the EK Property’s property tax, going so far as to agree with the suggestion that it was the Defendant who paid for it. ¹⁰² Still, there is insufficient evidential basis to support the figure of $13,420.50, for which the Defendant now seeks a contribution from the Claimant:

(a) Firstly, it is unclear to me just how the Defendant arrived at this figure. The Defendant has adduced a property tax bill for the year 2015 ¹⁰³ to demonstrate that at least $9,740.50 in property tax was payable for the EK Property. ¹⁰⁴ However, no explanation has been provided as to how the $9,740.50 feeds into the figure of $13,420.50, which the Defendant claims to have paid. Critically, the Defendant admitted while on the stand that he did not know how the $13,420.50 was derived – all he did was to ask his daughter-in-law to calculate the amount of property tax paid, without asking her how she arrived at the final figure. ¹⁰⁵

(b) Secondly, no evidence has been adduced to show that the amount of $13,420.50 was actually paid to the tax authorities. The Defendant adduced a bank statement showing various GIRO deductions ¹⁰⁶ but offers no explanation as to what the entries therein mean or how they correlate to the figure of $13,420.50 which he claims to have paid.

88 In my view, these evidential shortcomings cannot be overlooked, especially since it was within the Defendant’s power to obtain the relevant supporting documents. Since he is unable to prove that $13,420.50 was in indeed assessed as property tax and paid, his claim to be reimbursed for this sum fails.

89 I now turn to the Defendant’s claim for the commission which he contends that he is entitled to – in his capacity as a property agent – for having procured Jason’s tenancies.

90 The Defendant’s pleaded case is that he was entitled to commission of one month’s rent, ie, $7,800, for each of the four years during which the EK Property had been rented to Jason under the 1st and 2nd Tenancy Agreements – meaning that his total commission amounted to $31,200. ¹⁰⁷ The Defendant also pleaded that the Claimant was liable to pay him half of this sum, ie, $15,600. ¹⁰⁸ The Claimant, on his part, contends that the claim for a commission is without basis as he never agreed to pay any commission to the Defendant. ¹⁰⁹

91 The Defendant’s claim for commission has a bearing on the security deposit that he collected from Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement, which Jason subsequently used to offset the first two months of rent under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement (see [58] above). Specifically, the Defendant contends that he was entitled to retain the security deposit as payment for, inter alia, the commission earned by him in procuring Jason’s tenancies. ¹¹⁰

92 For the following reasons, I find that the Defendant has failed to sufficiently substantiate his claim that he was entitled to a commission for procuring Jason’s tenancies. Accordingly, I dismiss his claim that the Claimant pay him $15,600 as commission for procuring Jason’s tenancies.

93 For a start, the Defendant has failed to coherently frame his entitlement to a commission. As alluded to at [90] above, his pleaded case is that he was entitled to commission of $7,800 for each of the four years that the EK Property was leased to Jason, under the 1st and 2nd Tenancy Agreements – meaning that the total commission due to him was $31,200. He also pleaded that the Claimant was liable to pay half of this sum, ie, $15,600. However, these pleadings ran counter to his AEIC, in which he averred that he was entitled to commission of $7,800 for every two years that the EK Property was rented to Jason – meaning that the total commission due to him for the four years spanning the 1st and 2nd Tenancy Agreements was $15,600 (rather than $31,200). The Defendant’s AEIC then asserted that the Claimant was responsible for the full amount (rather than just half) of the commission of $15,600.

94 Furthermore, as explained below, the Defendant’s claim for commission was not supported by a plain reading of either the 1st Tenancy Agreement or 2nd Tenancy Agreement.

95 In so far as the 1st Tenancy Agreement is concerned, cl 5(g) contemplated that a commission would be payable by the landlord(s) upon renewal of the tenancy. Clause 5(g) is extracted below: ¹¹¹

This clause thus contemplated payment of a commission upon renewal of the lease in the 1st Tenancy Agreement. In other words, the obligation to pay a commission under the 1st Tenancy Agreement arose when the 2nd Tenancy Agreement was concluded.

96 The Defendant’s attempt to rely on this clause suffers from several difficulties. For a start, the Defendant has not adduced any evidence to demonstrate what the term “prevailing industrial rate” in cl 5(g) means and – more specifically – why this translates to the commission figure claimed by him.

97 More importantly, neither cl 5(g) nor any other clause in the 1st Tenancy Agreement suggested that the commission – which was payable by the landlord – was to be paid to the property agent (ie, the Defendant). Rather, cl 5(g) explicitly stated that the commission was payable to the agency (ie, PropNex). That any commission under the 1st Tenancy Agreement was payable to PropNex and not the Defendant is further reinforced by another clause in the 1st Tenancy Agreement, cl 5(l). Clause 5(l), extracted below, stated that the agency PropNex was not liable to refund the landlord any commission in the event of premature termination of the 1st Tenancy Agreement: ¹¹²

98 Under cross-examination, the Defendant conceded that the operation of the clauses above suggests that any commission under the 1st Tenancy Agreement was payable to PropNex rather than to him personally. ¹¹³ Notwithstanding, he tried to explain on the witness stand that he is claiming commission on PropNex’s behalf. ¹¹⁴ This assertion came as a surprise, given that it was not reflected anywhere in the Defendant’s pleadings. Rather, the Defence and Counterclaim, ¹¹⁵ in alluding to the Claimant’s “[f]ailure to pay the Defendant his rightful commission” ¹¹⁶ [emphasis added], clearly reflected that the Defendant is laying claim to the commission in his personal capacity.

99 Accordingly, the 1st Tenancy Agreement offers no basis for the Defendant’s claim for a commission.

100 As for the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, the main clause which the Defendant relies upon in support of his claim for a commission is cl 4. Unlike the 1st Tenancy Agreement, which stipulated that commission was payable to PropNex (rather than to the Defendant), cl 4 of the 2nd Tenancy Agreement explicitly named the Defendant as the person entitled to “renewal rental commission” of $7,800. Clause 4 is extracted below: ¹¹⁷

101 I should observe at the outset that the Defendant’s pleaded case, being that he is entitled to a commission of $7,800 for each year of the tenancy (see [90] above), is contradicted by the very terms of clause 4, which stipulated a commission of $7,800 for the entire two-year term under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement.

102 Furthermore, the Defendant has not explained why cl 4 should be construed as obliging the landlords (ie, the Parties) – as opposed to the tenant (ie, Jason) – to pay the commission stipulated therein. The clause merely stated that commission of $7,800 was to be paid to the Defendant, without specifying who was liable to make the payment. It is not possible to simply resolve this ambiguity in the Defendant’s favour, especially since cl 4 of the 2nd Tenancy Agreement comes immediately after cll 1 and 3, which set out the tenant’s payment obligations – specifically Jason’s obligation to pay rent and his agreement to the continued retention of the security deposit. So long as the Defendant is unable to establish that cl 4 obliges the landlord(s) to pay the commission, the alleged liability of the Claimant (as landlord) to bear half of that commission has not been made out.

103 More importantly, it has not been established that the Claimant agreed to be bound by cl 4, given that the latter never signed the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. The Defendant argues that as the Claimant had continued to accept half the rent paid by Jason under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement (see [53] above), the Claimant should be regarded as having acquiesced to its terms by his conduct. ¹¹⁸ This submission lacks merit. The Claimant was simply collecting what was legally due to him under s 73A CLPA (see [59] above). That entitlement existed independently of whatever terms the 2nd Tenancy Agreement might have contained.

104 In fact, the evidence is quite clear that the Claimant refused to sign the 2nd Tenancy Agreement precisely because he objected to the Defendant being conferred a commission under its terms. ¹¹⁹ This is amply corroborated by the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties just a few weeks prior to the commencement of the lease under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement. On the afternoon of 5 August 2019, the Claimant sent messages to the Defendant clarifying that he was prepared to sign the 2nd Tenancy Agreement but was not prepared to pay the commission specified under its terms. For example:

(a) At 2.49pm, the Claimant wrote: “I am not paying commission”. ¹²⁰

(b) Shortly after that, at 3.08pm, he followed up with another message stating: “I will sign the addendum: No commission”. ¹²¹

That same day, the Defendant responded by sending a message citing cl 5(g) of the 1st Tenancy Agreement (extracted at [95] above), which contemplated that a commission was payable upon renewal of the lease under the 1st Tenancy Agreement. ¹²² The Claimant replied one week later, on 12 August 2019, with the exact same message: “I will sign the addendum: No commission”. ¹²³

105 The documentary evidence thus debunks any suggestion that the Claimant had acquiesced to the terms of the 2nd Tenancy Agreement conferring upon the Defendant a right to a commission.

106 The Defendant’s claim for commission which he was purportedly entitled to, in his capacity as the property agent who procured Jason’s tenancies, thus fails. Neither the 1st Tenancy Agreement nor the 2nd Tenancy Agreement substantiate his claim to such a commission.

107 I summarise my findings in respect of the Parties’ respective claims relating to the EK Property.

(a) In respect of the Claimant’s claim for monthly rent of $4,000, for the period that the Defendant’s family resided at the EK Property:

(i) I dismiss the claim in respect of the months October 2014 to April 2015 as I find that – on balance – the Claimant did agree to let the Defendant’s family reside at the EK Property rent free for this duration, at least until Pinnacle was rented out.

(ii) I allow the claim in respect of the three months of September, October and November 2016.

(i) The first two months of the lease under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement, ie, August and September 2019, for which Jason had offset the rent against the two-month security deposit collected by the Defendant. Specifically, I allow the Claimant’s claim of $7,800, being his half share of the rent for these two months.

(ii) The five-month period spanning September 2021 to January 2022, during the 3rd Tenancy Agreement. Specifically, I allow the Claimant’s claim of $19,500, being his half share of the rent for this period.

(c) As regards the Defendant’s claims in relation to the rent collected from Jason, I make the following orders.

(i) I grant the Defendant’s prayer that the Claimant releases to the Defendant the latter’s half share of the rental proceeds collected from Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement, ie, half of the $142,971.04 currently in the SCB Joint Account. The Parties are to take collective steps to withdraw this amount from the SCB Joint Account and divide the same between themselves in equal shares. Any interest earned from the bank on the principal sums deposited into the SCB Joint Account is also to be withdrawn and divided equally between the Parties.

(ii) I dismiss the Defendant’s claims for:

(A) “excess rent” of $74,880, which the Claimant was alleged to have collected from Jason; and

(B) the Claimant to furnish an account of the rent collected from Jason.

(d) I also dismiss the Defendant’s claim that the Claimant reimburses him for the property tax of $13,420.50.

(e) Finally, I dismiss the Defendant’s claim for $15,600, being what he professes to be the Claimant’s half share of the commission purportedly due to the Defendant for having procured Jason’s tenancies.

108 The Defendant’s claim in defamation stems from an email dated 15 December 2021, which the Claimant had sent to PropNex inquiring about the commission payable under the 1st Tenancy Agreement (“PropNex Email”).

109 To better appreciate the purport of the PropNex Email, it is necessary to lay out the backdrop against which it was sent. As explained at [95] above, cl 5(g) of the 1st Tenancy Agreement contemplated that commission was payable in the event of the lease being renewed. It is also clear that the Defendant did collect what he deemed as commission due to him under the 1st Tenancy Agreement. As explained at [91] above, he appropriated Jason’s security deposit as his commission. The Defendant’s intentions in doing are expressly spelt out in his pleadings, extracted below: ¹²⁴

That the Defendant appropriated Jason’s security deposit as a means of satisfying the commission which he regarded as due to himself under the 1st Tenancy Agreement is also reflected in his WhatsApp messages:

(a) On 18 September 2017, in response to a message from the Claimant asking: “Where is the 2 month rental deposit?”, the Defendant replied: “One mth was meant for rental commission”. ¹²⁵

(b) Seven months later, on 24 April 2018, the Claimant again pressed the Defendant for the rental deposit, to which the Defendant responded that it had been applied to the Defendant’s commission of $7,800 and various “pre handover expenses”. ¹²⁶

(c) Five months later, in late September 2018, the Claimant made various allegations on a WhatsApp group chat to the effect that the Defendant failed to properly account for the security deposit. On 28 September 2018, the Defendant retorted to these allegations on the group chat with the following message: ¹²⁷

110 The Defendant’s act of appropriating the commission payable under the 1st Tenancy Agreement was questionable, given that (as discussed at [97] above) the commission was payable to PropNex and not to the Defendant. The Defendant himself testified that he was obliged to submit the commission to PropNex, so as to allow the latter to process its own cut of the commission. ¹²⁸ He explained that it would be “totally unacceptable” for him, as an agent, to retain the entire commission without submitting the same to PropNex. ¹²⁹

111 After the Defendant had appropriated the commission, the Claimant repeatedly pressed him for proof that the commission was submitted to PropNex. An example of this is seen in a WhatsApp message exchange between the Parties on 24 April 2018, extracted below, where the Claimant sought a receipt documenting submission of the commission to PropNex: ¹³⁰

The messages above show that the Defendant was reluctant to pay the commission to PropNex as this would incur 7% GST. In spite of this, the Claimant insisted on a receipt as he wanted “everything above board”. The Defendant had then responded at 11.15am saying: “Receipts will be provided”. ¹³¹ However, the Defendant never produced any receipt to document the submission of the commission to PropNex.

112 Consequently, on 15 December 2021, the Claimant sent the PropNex Email, in which he voiced his suspicions that the commission appropriated by the Defendant may not have been submitted to PropNex. ¹³² The text of the PropNex Email, ¹³³ which was sent to the email address designated by PropNex for whistleblower complaints, is extracted below:

113 PropNex eventually responded to the Claimant via an email dated 22 April 2022 confirming that the Defendant did not submit to PropNex the commission which the latter had appropriated from Jason’s security deposit. ¹³⁴ During the trial, the Defendant also conceded that he never submitted the commission to PropNex. ¹³⁵

114 The Defendant’s case is that the PropNex Email was defamatory as it suggested that he was dishonest, thereby lowering his reputation in the eyes of his colleagues at PropNex. ¹³⁶ He thus claims against the Claimant for damages for libel to be assessed. ¹³⁷ The Claimant’s defence is that he was simply raising concerns to PropNex about the lack of a receipt, rather than accusing the Defendant of misconduct. ¹³⁸ In any event, the Claimant contends ¹³⁹ that the contents of the PropNex Email qualify for the defences of justification ¹⁴⁰ and qualified privilege. ¹⁴¹

115 For the reasons below, I dismiss the Defendant’s claim in defamation. In summary, I find that:

(a) the PropNex Email was defamatory; but

(b) the Claimant is entitled to raise the defences of justification and qualified privilege.

I elaborate on each of these findings below.

116 To establish the tort of defamation, a claimant needs to demonstrate that the statement in question (a) is defamatory in nature; (b) refers to the claimant; and (c) is published: see Golden Season Pte Ltd v Kairos Singapore Holdings Pte Ltd [2015] 2 SLR 751 (“Golden Season”) at [35]. In the present case, it is not disputed that elements (b) and (c) are present – the PropNex Email was published to PropNex and referred clearly to the Defendant. The key element at issue is thus whether the PropNex Email was defamatory in nature.

117 As explained in Golden Season (at [36]), a statement is considered defamatory if it (a) lowers the claimant in the estimation of right-thinking members of society generally; (b) causes him to be shunned or avoided; or (c) exposes him to hatred, contempt or ridicule. The Defendant’s case appears to be that the PropNex Email defamed him along the lines of (a). This can be gleaned from the following section of the Defendant’s pleadings: ¹⁴²

While not explicitly enunciated in his pleadings, the Defendant’s position appears to be that the words in the PropNex Email are defamatory in their natural and ordinary meaning – the Defendant not having pleaded that they were defamatory by way of innuendo.

118 In Chan Cheng Wah Bernard v Koh Sin Chong Freddie [2012] 1 SLR 506 (“Bernard Chan”), the Court of Appeal expounded on the approach for determining if the words at issue are indeed defamatory in their natural and ordinary meaning. The court held (at [18]):

119 I agree that the PropNex Email was defamatory, bearing in mind the natural and ordinary meaning of its words, as it sought to impute to the Defendant a serious act, ie, pocketing commission that he should have handed to his principal. In this respect, words imputing a serious act to a claimant may be pitched at varying levels of certainty: see Ng Koo Kay Benedict v Zim Integrated Shipping Services Ltd [2010] 2 SLR 860 (“Benedict Ng”) at [16], citing the English Court of Appeal decision in Chase v News Group Newspapers [2002] EWCA Civ 1772 (“Chase”) at [45]. Specifically, in associating a claimant with a serious act, an allegation may convey that:

(a) the claimant did in fact committed the serious act (“Chase Level One”);

Allegations falling into any of the three levels above may potentially be regarded as defamatory, albeit to varying degrees: see Benedict Ng at [17]. Specifically, an allegation where the degree of certainty is pitched at Chase Level One carries the highest defamatory sting, while an allegation where it is pitched at Chase Level Three carries the lowest.

120 In so far as the PropNex Email is concerned, the statement: “I suspect the said commission is not submitted to PropNex” [emphasis added] pegs the degree of certainty with which the serious act (pocketing the commission without submitting the same to PropNex) was imputed to the Defendant at Chase Level Two. This statement voiced the suspicion that the Defendant had committed the serious act, while proffering his failure to produce a receipt from PropNex as reasonable grounds for that suspicion. Its words were defamatory in that they conveyed that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that the Defendant pocketed monies that should have been handed over to his principal.

121 These observations must then be juxtaposed against the defamatory meaning actually pleaded by the Defendant. The Defence and Counterclaim did not simply state that the PropNex Email defamed the Defendant by suggesting that he pocketed his principal’s commission. It went further, pleading that the PropNex Email defamed him by “suggesting that he was dishonest” (see extract at [117] above). The difficulty with this pleaded meaning is that there was nothing in the PropNex Email which conceivably touched on the Defendant’s state of mind. From the perspective of someone reading the PropNex Email, the Defendant could well have been labouring under a host of other mental states (eg, recklessness or negligence) – and not necessarily dishonesty, when he appropriated the commission. Accordingly, the Defendant’s pleadings (which are binding on him) attributed a greater defamatory sting to the PropNex Email than what its words actually carried.

122 Still, even if a claimant pleads a defamatory meaning carrying a greater sting than what the impugned statement actually conveys, he is still entitled at trial to rely on the less defamatory meaning, so long as this does not amount to a substantially different allegation from what was pleaded. In Slim v Daily Telegraph Ltd [1968] 2 QB 157, Diplock LJ (as he then was) observed (at 175):

123 The views of Diplock LJ above were cited with approval by the Court of Appeal in Review Publishing Co Ltd v Lee Hsien Loong [2010] 1 SLR 52 (“Review Publishing”), at [118] and [128]. The Court of Appeal in Review Publishing also observed (at [131]) that “a more serious allegation would usually include a less serious one, with the result that the court may find a less defamatory meaning than that originally pleaded” [emphasis added], although the court also caveated that:

124 Given the guiding principles above, I take the view that even if the PropNex Email did not impute the more defamatory meaning as pleaded by the Defendant (ie, that he was dishonest) but imputed a less defamatory meaning (that he pocketed commission due to his principal, whether out of dishonesty or otherwise), he is nevertheless entitled to rely on the less defamatory meaning at trial. The less defamatory meaning in this case does not differ substantially from that pleaded and in fact constitutes the substratum from which the more defamatory meaning which was pleaded (ie, that he was dishonest) is inferred.

125 This then brings me to the nub of my decision in respect of the defamation claim. Even if the PropNex Email was defamatory, has the Claimant succeeded in establishing the defences of justification and qualified privilege? In my view, the Claimant succeeds in both these defences.

126 For his plea of justification, the Claimant must prove that the imputation conveyed by the defamatory words are true. In Bernard Chan, the Court of Appeal observed (at [43]):

127 In this case, I have explained in the preceding section that the PropNex Email was defamatory, to the extent that it conveyed that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that the Defendant pocketed the commission which should have been paid to PropNex (see [120] above). To succeed in the defence of justification, the Claimant must establish that this statement was true, ie, that there were indeed reasonable grounds for such a suspicion.

128 Proceeding on that basis, I find that the defence of justification is clearly made out. As at the time the PropNex email was sent, there were eminently reasonable grounds to suspect that the Defendant did pocket the commission under the 1st Tenancy Agreement, without submitting the same to PropNex:

Viewed cumulatively, both factors above provided ample grounds to suspect that the Defendant failed to submit the commission to PropNex. Pertinently, this suspicion was borne out by subsequent events. As explained at [113] above, it is now established that the commission was never submitted by the Defendant to PropNex for processing.

129 The defence of justification is thus made out. That alone suffices to defeat the Defendant’s claim for defamation. Nevertheless, for completeness, I will go on to examine the Claimant’s other defence to the defamation claim, ie, that of qualified privilege.

130 There are various categories of situations where the defence of qualified privilege may defeat an action for defamation. One such instance was canvassed in Golden Season, where the court cited (at [91]) the following passage from Gary Chan Kok Yew & Lee Pey Woan, The Law of Torts in Singapore (Academy Publishing, 2011) at para 13.069):

131 Applying that principle to the present case, it is clear that the Claimant’s defence of qualified privilege is amply substantiated. On the face of cl 5(g) of the 1st Tenancy Agreement (extracted at [95] above), the party obliged to pay PropNex the commission stipulated by that clause would be the landlord(s), ie, the Parties. The Claimant thus had an interest in ensuring that any rent that was otherwise owing from himself but which had been appropriated by the Defendant – ostensibly for purposes of the commission under the 1st Tenancy Agreement – was indeed channelled towards discharging the Claimant’s liability for that commission. In writing to PropNex to voice his reservations about whether the commission had indeed been so channelled, the Claimant was doing no more than protecting his own interest.

132 The defence of qualified privilege is also available when there is reciprocity of interests between communicator and recipient, in that (a) the communicator of the defamatory words has an interest or duty (whether legal, social or moral) to communicate the information concerned; and (b) the recipient has a corresponding interest or duty to receive that information. In Bernard Chan, the Court of Appeal cited (at [87]) the judgment of the Privy Council’s decision in Seaga v Harper [2009] AC 1, where Lord Carswell explained (at [5]):

Such reciprocity of interests is clearly discernible on the present facts. Apart from the Claimant’s interest in communicating his concerns about the commission to PropNex (canvassed in the immediately preceding paragraph), PropNex also had a corresponding interest in ensuring that its own agents abided by the obligations placed on them under PropNex’s standard form contracts. This is seen in how PropNex, after having been alerted by the PropNex Email to the Defendant’s failure to submit the commission, replied to the Claimant that the Defendant’s “failure to meet his obligations to the Company” was “an internal matter … and will be dealt with accordingly”. ¹⁴³

133 The defence of qualified privilege may nevertheless be defeated if it can be shown that the defendant was actuated by malice when publishing the defamatory statement: Bernard Chan at [86]. Malice may be established by showing either of the following elements, set out in Bernard Chan (at [90]):

In his closing submissions, the Defendant alleged that the Claimant was disqualified from the defence of qualified privilege because the PropNex Email had been actuated by malice. ¹⁴⁴

134 I refuse to entertain the allegation of malice as it was never pleaded by the Defendant. The requirement that malice be pleaded is found in O 43 r 3(3) of the Rules of Court 2021 (“ROC”), extracted below:

135 At trial, when Defendant’s counsel sought to put to the Claimant that the PropNex Email was actuated by malice, Claimant’s counsel immediately objected on the ground that malice was never pleaded. ¹⁴⁵ Defendant’s counsel retorted that since the Claimant’s plea of qualified privilege was only raised for the very first time in the Defence to Counterclaim, and the ROC disallows further pleadings after that, the Defendant effectively had no further medium through which malice could be pleaded. ¹⁴⁶ With respect, this objection was misplaced. It is of course true that O 2 r 9(3) ROC disallows the filing of further rounds of pleadings after the Defence (or Defence to Counterclaim) without the court’s approval. However, there was nothing in this case preventing the Defendant from seeking such approval to file a further pleading, raising the allegation of malice. In fact, O 43 r 3(3) ROC (extracted immediately above) – which mandates that malice be pleaded – explicitly contemplates that pleading of malice is done “with permission of the Court”: see also Singapore Civil Procedure 2025 vol 1 (Cavinder Bull gen ed) (Sweet & Maxwell, 2024) at para 43/3/8. The Defendant thus ought to have sought the court’s permission to file a reply to the Defence to Counterclaim, so that his allegation of malice could be pleaded. It bears re-iterating that his Defence and Counterclaim had been amended four times (see [27] above). It is thus difficult to conceive of an excuse for his failure to plead the allegation of malice, when the sufficiency of his pleadings was patently a live issue in his litigation strategy.

136 Malice must be pleaded because it embodies a very serious allegation. As observed by Hoo Sheau Peng JC (as she then was) in Ezion Holdings Ltd v Credit Suisse AG [2018] 3 SLR 356 (“Ezion Holdings”) (at [26]):

The requirement to plead malice also has significant procedural implications. For example, it affords the party claiming qualified privilege the opportunity to strike out the allegation of malice at an early stage if that allegation prejudices, embarrasses or delays the trial: Ezion Holdings at [28].

137 The Defendant nevertheless asks the court to exercise its discretion under O 3 r 2(1) ROC to waive the requirement that malice be pleaded, on the ground that it would be in the interests of justice to do so. ¹⁴⁷ However, the reasons advanced by the Defendant in support of that request are unpersuasive:

(a) Firstly, the Defendant says that it is “plain from the facts” that there was express malice on the Claimant’s part, ¹⁴⁸ especially given how the PropNex Email had been sent long after the Parties’ relationship had soured. ¹⁴⁹ However, the delay in sending the PropNex Email could have been attributed to a host of reasons – the Defendant has not explained why any such delay is necessarily suggestive of malice.

(b) Secondly, the Defendant argues that he did “in effect” plead malice, by virtue of the following sentence at para 102 of his Defence and Counterclaim: “The words [in the PropNex Email] were calculated to disparage the Defendant in his profession.” ¹⁵⁰ I reject this submission as well. All this sentence does is allude to the PropNex Email being defamatory. There is nothing in the Defendant’s pleadings alerting the reader to the Defendant’s intent to allege any of the elements of malice as laid out at [133] above.

In short, the justifications proffered by the Defendant above are nothing short of a flimsy. Sanctioning them would be tantamount to paying lip service to an important procedural safeguard.

138 Consequently, I uphold the Claimant’s defence of qualified privilege and reject the Defendant’s attempt to raise the allegation of malice.

139 At around the time that the lease under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement commenced, the Defendant found a buyer for the EK Property (“Buyer”). On 11 September 2021, the Parties signed an Option to Purchase (“OTP”) with the Buyer, under which they agreed to sell the EK Property for $5m. ¹⁵¹ This sale was ultimately completed in April 2022, ¹⁵² after the lease under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement expired.

140 Critically, the Parties also signed the Handwritten Note on 11 September 2021, in conjunction with the signing of the OTP. By the Handwritten Note, the Parties jointly agreed to set aside $600,000 from the proceeds of sale of the EK Property, from which George and Jack would each receive $300,000. The Claimant now seeks to compel the Defendant to honour the Handwritten Note’s terms (ie, to pay $600,000 from the EK Property’s sale proceeds to George and Jack), while the Defendant seeks to impugn the Handwritten Note on the grounds of lack of consideration and economic duress.

141 To better understand the genesis of the Handwritten Note, it is necessary to lay out the factual background in some detail. After the Testatrix’s passing in 2012, the relationship between the four brothers – the Parties, George and Jack – grew strained, due in no small part to the fact that the Will left nothing to George and Jack despite these two brothers surviving the Testatrix: see [2] above. In or around June 2018, the Parties’ uncle, Tam Sook (who resides in Mauritius) flew to Singapore to try and achieve reconciliation between the brothers. To that end, Tam Sook proposed that the Parties should each contribute $300,000, where these monies would then be used to pay $300,000 to George and $300,000 to Jack. ¹⁵³ The Parties orally agreed in principle to Tam Sook’s proposal – this oral agreement is referred to as the “Oral AIP”. ¹⁵⁴

142 The payments contemplated by the Oral AIP (where George and Jack would each receive $300,000) were ultimately never made. The Parties hold diverging perspectives as to the purport of the Oral AIP:

(a) The Defendant contends that under the Oral AIP, a condition of the payments to George and Jack was that the EK Property be sold by 30 September 2018. ¹⁵⁵ Since this condition was never met (the sale of the EK Property having taken place only in April 2022), the Defendant contends that the Oral AIP was superseded. ¹⁵⁶

(b) The Claimant disagrees that the Oral AIP hinged on any such condition, maintaining that the 30 September 2018 date was merely a target date for the payments to be made to George and Jack. ¹⁵⁷

Notwithstanding the Parties’ conflicting views as to the Oral AIP’s terms, the Claimant has made it clear that his claim to compel the Defendant to honour the payments contemplated by the Oral AIP (ie, for George and Jack to each receive $300,000 from the Parties) is not based on the Oral AIP but on the Handwritten Note that was subsequently signed on 11 September 2021. ¹⁵⁸

143 This then brings me to how the Handwritten Note came into being. In early September 2021, the Defendant informed the Claimant about the Buyer’s offer to pay $5m for the EK Property. ¹⁵⁹ The Defendant accordingly sought to procure the signature of the Claimant (as co-owner of the EK Property) on the OTP. On 11 September 2021, the Defendant brought the OTP to a meeting with the Claimant, intending for the Claimant to sign the same. ¹⁶⁰ However, during this meeting, the Claimant flatly told the Defendant that he was not signing the OTP unless the Defendant agreed to George and Jack each receiving $300,000 (being the payments contemplated by the Oral AIP) from the sale proceeds. To document the Defendant’s agreement to this condition, the Claimant produced the Handwritten Note for the Defendant’s signature. The terms of the Handwritten Note are extracted below: ¹⁶¹

144  Agitated by the Claimant’s demand that the Defendant sign the Handwritten Note, the Defendant raised his voice and an argument ensued. The altercation culminated in the Claimant walking away from the meeting without signing the OTP and without the Handwritten Note being signed by the Defendant. ¹⁶² After a few minutes, the Defendant capitulated and reached out to the Claimant, telling him that the Defendant would sign the Handwritten Note. The Parties accordingly met once more and, this time, both of them signed the Handwritten Note. ¹⁶³ Upon the Defendant signing the Handwritten Note, the Claimant signed the OTP. ¹⁶⁴

145 The very next day (ie, 12 September 2021), at 3.20pm, the Defendant sent the Claimant the following WhatsApp message, ¹⁶⁵ in which the Defendant disavowed the Handwritten Note and declared that he signed it out of duress: ¹⁶⁶

The Claimant retorted with a message that same day at 8.41pm stating that the Claimant would also regard the OTP as having been vitiated, offering to return the Defendant the cashier’s order that had been furnished by the Buyer. ¹⁶⁷

146 Notwithstanding this skirmish, the sale of the EK Property was duly completed on 8 April 2022. The sale proceeds were distributed between the Parties, save for the sum of $600,000, which lay at the heart of the dispute surrounding the Handwritten Note. The Parties agreed to carve this sum out from the sale proceeds and deposit it into the SCB Joint Account. ¹⁶⁸ As explained at [65] above, any withdrawal from the SCB Joint Account must be authorised by both the Parties, meaning that neither of them can make withdrawals without the other’s concurrence. By securing the $600,000 in this fashion, the Parties were able to proceed with the sale of the EK Property without their disagreement over the Handwritten Note scuttling completion. ¹⁶⁹

147 The balance in the SCB Joint Account currently stands at $743,076.50. ¹⁷⁰ This includes the $142,971.04 worth of rent collected under the 1st Tenancy Agreement (see [52] above) plus the $600,000 which the Parties set aside from the EK Property’s sale proceeds (as per the immediately preceding paragraph). As regards the $142,971.04, I have already explained at [68] above that this is to be released and divided between the Parties equally (together with any interest earned on the account balance that has been credited by the bank into the account). This leaves the $600,000, over which the Parties remain deadlocked:

(a) The Claimant refuses to allow the Defendant to withdraw any part of the $600,000, which the Claimant views as payable to George and Jack under the Handwritten Note. ¹⁷¹

(b) The Defendant refuses to authorise the disbursement of the $600,000 to George and Jack, ¹⁷² taking the position that the Handwritten Note was invalidated on two distinct grounds: ¹⁷³

(i) lack of consideration; and

(ii) economic duress and/or unconscionability.

148 The Claimant thus prays for the reliefs set out in the following paragraphs of the Statement of Claim: ¹⁷⁴

149 The Defendant, on his part, prays for an order compelling the Claimant to release what the Defendant views to be his half share of the $600,000 in the SCB Joint Account, ¹⁷⁵ as well as lost interest arising from the Claimant wrongfully detaining the Defendant’s funds in the SCB Joint Account. ¹⁷⁶

150 In my view, the Handwritten Note was a validly concluded contract which the Defendant is now obliged to honour. In arriving at this conclusion:

(a) I reject the Defendant’s submission that the Handwritten Note was not supported by consideration from the Claimant.

(b) I also reject the Defendant’s submission that the Handwritten Note was vitiated by economic duress.

151 I set out my reasons below.

152 By way of preliminary observation, the Handwritten Note appears to have been signed with the Parties having intended to create legal relations. Such an intention is a necessary element for the formation of a valid contract. As explained by Andrew Phang JA (as he then was) when he delivered the judgment of the Court of Appeal in Gay Choon Ing (at [71]):

153 The Court of Appeal in Gay Choon Ing had also alluded (at [72]) to the presumption that in social and domestic arrangements, parties do not intend to create legal relations. However, on the facts of the present case, it would appear inappropriate to apply that presumption (notwithstanding the Parties being brothers) given the acrimony between them at the point the Handwritten Note was signed: see Ong Wui Teck v Ong Wui Swoon [2019] SGCA 61 (“Ong Wui Teck”) at [46]. By that point, the ties between the Parties had already been fractured with discord. ¹⁷⁷ In fact, the relationship had started to sour from as early as seven years before that, in 2014. ¹⁷⁸

154 In any case, even if the presumption in Gay Choon Ing applied, it would have been amply rebutted by the very nature of the Handwritten Note. This is a document that was reduced into writing, dated and signed. Such steps strongly suggest that the Parties intended to inject a degree of formality into the document that would facilitate proof of its terms and the fact of Parties’ assent thereto, in anticipation of the eventuality of these terms having to be enforced.

155 I now turn to the Defendant’s submission that the Handwritten Note was not supported by consideration from the Claimant. In my view, this submission fails. As a co-owner of the EK Property, the Claimant had every right to withhold his consent to its sale. His act of sanctioning the sale by signing the OTP thus constituted valid consideration, in exchange for the Defendant signing the Handwritten Note. The Defendant nevertheless submits that the Claimant’s signing of the OTP could not constitute valid consideration for the Defendant signing the Handwritten Note. The Defendant’s line of reasoning is as follows.

(a) Prior to the signing of the OTP, the Claimant had been asking the Defendant extract various onerous concessions from the Buyer. ¹⁷⁹ These included: ¹⁸⁰

(i) asking the Buyer incur the cost of procuring a cashier’s order upfront, despite the OTP not being signed yet;

(ii) amending the OTP to explicitly stipulate the name of the Buyer, so that he would be unable to transfer the option to any third party; and

(iii) hiking the option fee payable by the Buyer to 10%, when the fee typically charged was only 5%.

Critically, the Defendant claims that the Claimant entered into a prior agreement with him, under which the Defendant would help secure the Buyer’s agreement to these extraordinary demands, in exchange for which the Claimant would sign the OTP ¹⁸¹ (“Prior Agreement”).

(b) The Defendant ultimately succeeded in getting the Buyer to meet these demands (onerous though they were), meaning that the Claimant then had to abide by his side of the bargain under the Prior Agreement, being to sign the OTP. ¹⁸² The Claimant’s act of signing the OTP thus constituted consideration for the Prior Agreement. This same act could therefore no longer serve as consideration again, for the Defendant’s act of signing the Handwritten Note. Accordingly, the Handwritten Note required fresh consideration from the Claimant. ¹⁸³ As none was provided, the Handwritten Note was not supported by consideration. ¹⁸⁴

156 The difficulty with the Defendant’s claims about the Prior Agreement is that he is unable to point to any communications evincing that the Claimant agreed to sign the OTP, in exchange for the Defendant getting the Buyer to meet the Claimant’s demands at [155(a)] above. Of relevance would be the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties on 6 September 2021, ie, just five days before the signing of the Handwritten Note, which allude to these demands. The messages are extracted below: ¹⁸⁵

The last message from Claimant in the extract above – “We shall see the market then” – is illuminating. Rather than committing himself to signing the OTP in exchange for the Buyer’s compliance with his demands, the Claimant was patently adhering to a non-committal stance vis‑à‑vis the sale. Indeed, I find it difficult to conceive of how the Claimant could have contractually bound himself to sign the OTP when he had yet to even have sight of it.

157 Consequently, I reject the Defendant’s submission that the Claimant’s act of signing the OTP was pursuant to the alleged Prior Agreement. The evidence simply does not support the allegation that the Claimant undertook to sign the OTP in exchange for the Defendant procuring the Buyer’s compliance with the Claimant’s demands. There is consequently nothing to prevent the Claimant’s act of signing the OTP from serving as valid consideration for the Defendant’s act of signing the Handwritten Note.

158 The Handwritten Note was therefore a validly concluded contract, entered into with an intention by the Parties to create legal relations and supported by consideration from both sides. The Claimant is entitled to demand the performance of its terms unless the Defendant can show that the Handwritten Note was vitiated for some reason or other.

159 I turn to the Defendant’s submission that the Handwritten Note was procured by economic duress. If he succeeds in proving this, the Handwritten Note would be voidable at his instance: Ong Chai Koon v Ong Chai Soon [2021] SGHC 76 at [119]. The rationale underlying the doctrine of economic duress was explained by Lord Diplock in Universe Tankships Inc of Monrovia v International Transport Workers Federation [1983] 1 AC 366 at 384:

Accordingly, for economic duress to be made out, the Defendant must establish the following elements (Tjong Very Sumito v Chan Sing En [2012] 3 SLR 953 at [247]):

(a) the exertion of illegitimate pressure; and

(b) compulsion of the victim’s will by such pressure.

160 Additionally, the element of causation must be present, in that the duress must have induced the victim to enter into the impugned transaction: Tam Tak Chuen v Khairul bin Abdul Rahman [2009] 2 SLR(R) 240 (“Tam Tak Chuen”) at [62]. Causation is assessed using the “but for” test: Oon Swee Gek v Violet Oon Inc Pte Ltd [2024] 6 SLR 313 (“Violet Oon”) at [53].

161 I now discuss the above elements in turn.

162 To be vitiated by economic duress, the agreement must have been procured by the exertion of illegitimate pressure. In this respect, the pressure exerted on a party to enter into an agreement could either be unlawful or lawful.

(a) As regards unlawful pressure, the archetypal example would be the threat to break a contract if the party fails to accede to the perpetrator’s demands. Pressure which is unlawful has generally been regarded as illegitimate: see The Law of Contract in Singapore (Andrew Phang gen ed) (Academy Publishing, 2nd Ed, 2022) (“The Law of Contract in Singapore”) at para 12.037.

(b) As regards lawful pressure, the threat of lawful action can also constitute illegitimate pressure in certain circumstances, although care must be taken to avoid branding “the rough and tumble of the pressures of normal commercial bargaining” as economic duress that vitiates a contract: see the judgment of Dyson J in DSND Subsea Ltd v Petroleum Geo-Services ASA [2000] BLR 530 at 545, cited with approval by Quentin Loh J in E C Investment Holding Pte Ltd v Ridout Residence Pte Ltd [2011] 2 SLR 232 (“E C Investment Holding”) at [52].

163 In Tam Tak Chuen, Judith Prakash J (as she then was) cited (at [50]) para 3-031 of Nelson Enonchong, Duress, Undue Influence and Unconscionable Dealing (Sweet & Maxwell, 2006) (“Enonchong”), where the learned author listed four categories of pressure from lawful action that might potentially be considered illegitimate:

While the categories above are couched rather broadly, case law offers some insights as to how they might manifest themselves in practice:

(a) As regards category (a) – abuse of legal process – illegitimate pressure may conceivably be discerned if the defendant “was implicitly threatening legal action that he knew had no merit … in a calculated fashion to take advantage of the [claimant’s] weakness”: Violet Oon at [68].

(b) As regards category (b) – demands that are not bona fide – illegitimate pressure has been held to arise when the perpetrator “carefully orchestrated” an ambush by which his demands were sprung on the victim in a manner carefully calculated to unnerve the latter into acceptance: Tam Tak Chuen at [55] and [59]. Similarly, where the demand is based not on facts but on exaggerations, this may well be a relevant factor in determining if the demand was made bona fide: Violet Oon at [63].

(c) In relation to category (c) – demands which are unreasonable – an instance of this can be seen in the facts of Tam Tak Chuen, where Prakash J observed that the plaintiff had been compelled to “g[i]ve up his shares for nothing” (at [48]), under the threat of compromising videos of the plaintiff being made public (at [58]).

(d) As for category (d) – unconscionable threats – Prakash J had in Tam Tak Chuen cited (at [22]) para 3-031 of Enonchong, where the learned author observed that threats of lawful action have been regarded as illegitimate where:

164 As regards category (d), it is apparent from the extract above that this holds the potential for significant overlap with category (c) (ie, “where the demand is unreasonable”). The formulation of category (d) above has been the subject of some criticism. The learned authors of The Law of Contract in Singapore observed (at para 12.073) that:

Reservations about category (d) were also expressed in E C Investment Holding, where Loh J cautioned (at [49]) that deeming pressure as illegitimate – simply because it led to manifestly disadvantageous contractual terms – could “open the door to uncertainty” and “comes too close to re-writing disadvantageous contracts”.

165 In my respectful view, Loh J’s concerns are valid. Whether the terms of a contract are so manifestly disadvantageous as to be considered “unconscionable” – bearing in mind that this is a term which does not lend itself to any degree of precise delineation – is something which reasonable men can easily hold diametrically opposing views. The need for predictability in commercial dealings militates against an overly liberal approach in finding illegitimate pressure on this ground. Ultimately, the question may well boil down to one of degree. Disadvantageous contractual terms are an everyday by‑product of uneven bargaining power and thus offer no excuse for contracting parties to go back on their promises. However, there may be rare situations where contractual terms are so lopsided that they elude any commercial explanation for why someone would agree to them, thereby necessitating closer scrutiny of any allegations that illegitimate pressure tactics were applied to extract these terms. An example of this can be gleaned from the facts of Tam Tak Chuen, where Prakash J observed that the plaintiff was effectively made to “g[i]ve up his shares for nothing” (see [163(c)] above).

166 Having said that, the need for commercial certainty dictates against pegging the needle at too low a threshold. Loh J had thus opined that it will be rare for a contract to be set aside on account of pressure by lawful means – see E C Investment Holdings at [51]:

This view also accords with the observation at para 3-022 of Enonchong, which was cited in Tam Tak Chuen (at [50]), where the learned author highlighted that the need for certainty in the commercial bargaining process means that it will be “relatively rare” for lawful pressure to be deemed illegitimate:

167 With the above principles in mind, I turn to assess the Defendant’s claim that the Handwritten Note should be vitiated, on account of economic duress. To clarify, the Defendant’s pleadings actually state that the Handwritten Note was signed “under economic duress and/or unconscionability” ¹⁸⁶ [emphasis added] (see [147(b)(ii)] above). However, it is apparent from the Defendant’s submissions that he is not seeking to invoke the substantive doctrine of unconscionability, as expounded by the Court of Appeal in BOM v BOK [2019] 1 SLR 349. Rather, the Defendant appears to merely be relying on what he perceives to be the unconscionability of the Handwritten Note’s terms, to establish the illegitimacy of the pressure he faced when signing it, ¹⁸⁷ ie, that the pressure fell within category (d) in [163] above.

168 According to the Defendant, the pressure applied by the Claimant to subjugate him into signing the Handwritten Note came in the form of the Claimant’s threat to refuse signing the OTP. In arguing that this pressure was illegitimate, the Defendant seeks to draw an analogy with the case of Progress Bulk Carriers Ltd v Tube City IMS LLC (The Cenk Kaptanoglu) [2012] 2 All ER (Comm) 855 (“Progress Bulk Carriers”), where the claim of economic duress succeeded. ¹⁸⁸ In that case, the plaintiffs had chartered a ship from a shipowner who subsequently committed a repudiatory breach by chartering the ship to a third party. The shipowner thereafter proposed procuring a substitute ship for the plaintiffs at a reduced freight but insisted that this alternative would require the plaintiffs to waive their claims for the repudiatory breach. The plaintiffs accepted these terms under protest.

169 I fail to see how Progress Bulk Carriers assists the Defendant’s defence of economic duress. The pressure in that case arose from the shipowner committing a repudiatory breach of contract that ultimately allowed it to hold the plaintiffs to ransom (see [39]). The shipowner then used the prospect of a substitute arrangement to corral the plaintiffs into waiving their claims against the shipowner. The key trait which rendered the pressure in Progress Bulk Carriers illegitimate – being the unlawfulness of that pressure (stemming from a breach of contract) – is clearly inapplicable here. There was nothing unlawful in the Claimant’s refusal to sign the OTP. As a tenant in common of the EK Property, he had a right to decide whether (and when) to sell his half share.

170 The Defendant also claims that the demand for him to sign the Handwritten Note was not bona fide, ie, falling within the category of illegitimate pressure in category (b) at [163] above. Specifically, the Defendant contends that the circumstances under which the Handwritten Note was signed – laid out at [144] above – demonstrate that the Claimant had intentionally sprung the Handwritten Note on him by surprise, at the very last minute, just as the Defendant was trying to secure the Claimant’s signature on the OTP. ¹⁸⁹ The Defendant thus claims that the present situation is similar to that in Tam Tak Chuen (referred to at [163(b)] above).

171 In Tam Tak Chuen, the plaintiff and defendant were both doctors who shared a medical practice comprising several medical companies. The defendant managed to obtain video footage from a camera that he had furtively installed in the clinic, capturing the plaintiff engaging in sexual activity with a clinic employee. After procuring the video, the defendant spent the next three months orchestrating his plans for confronting the plaintiff with it. Thereafter, the defendant called for a meeting with the plaintiff, on the pretext of discussing one of their clinics. At this meeting, the defendant revealed the video, while concurrently presenting the plaintiff with various alternatives – including one where the defendant would apply to wind the medical companies up and tender the video as evidence in the application. The only serious alternative open to the plaintiff was for him to resign as a director of the companies and sell his shares therein to the defendant at a tremendous undervalue. The defendant also had the necessary share transfer forms at the ready, drafted in preparation for the meeting, so that the plaintiff could sign them on the spot. Unnerved by the sudden turn of events, the plaintiff signed various documents at the meeting, including the share transfers.

172 Subsequently, the plaintiff applied to have the documents signed by him set aside on account of economic duress. In allowing the plaintiff’s claim, Prakash J observed (at [55]) that the defendant’s actions had been “very carefully orchestrated”. His preparations included taking legal advice and having the share transfer documents drafted well in advance, so that they were ready for execution at the meeting. Prakash J concluded (at [59]):

173  In my view, the facts of the present case simply cannot be likened to those in Tam Tak Chuen. The Defendant’s complaint about the Handwritten Note having been “sprung” on him does not cohere with the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties on 4 September 2021, being a week before the Handwritten Note was signed. I extract these messages below: ¹⁹⁰

By way of clarification, the Claimant’s message “you must pay all money owing to George, Jack” (at 1.53pm above) was referring to the payment of $300,000 to each of these two other brothers, as contemplated by the Oral AIP – this was also the Defendant’s understanding of the message. ¹⁹¹

174 The following observations can be made about the WhatsApp messages extracted above:

(a) When the Defendant messaged the Claimant on 4 September 2021 about signing the sale-related documents, the latter’s immediate response was to ask the Defendant to make the payments to George and Jack contemplated by the Oral AIP (message at 1.53pm above).

(b) The Claimant’s message further explained that he wanted to “clear all matters for once” and ensure that the efforts by Tam Sook in brokering the Oral AIP were not wasted (message at 2.40pm above).

(c) When the Defendant tried to placate the Claimant by suggesting that the latter could pay George directly while the Defendant would “settle [his] directly” with Jack (message at 2.40pm above), the Claimant insisted that the amounts contemplated by the Oral AIP be paid to George and Jack from the proceeds of sale of the EK Property (see message at 2.41pm above).

By these messages, the Claimant made it unmistakeably clear that he expected the Defendant to honour the payments which the Parties had agreed to make under the Oral AIP. The Claimant also explicitly tethered the sale of the EK Property to these payments being made.

175 In spite of the Claimant foreshadowing his designs from such an early stage – an entire week before the OTP was signed on 11 September 2021 – the Defendant pleaded that he had disregarded the Claimant’s words. ¹⁹² Under such circumstances, it is simply not open to the Defendant to complain that the Handwritten Note (which obliged him to make the payments to George and Jack contemplated by the Oral AIP) had been – to use the term in Tam Tak Chuen (at [59]) – “sprung” on him.

176 Furthermore, the bases advanced by the Defendant to support his claims of illegitimate pressure by the Claimant fail to pass muster. Specifically, the Defendant claims that he was subjected to pressure on two fronts:

(a) Firstly, the Defendant claims that he had purchased a Housing and Development Board (“HDB”) flat in Toa Payoh in July 2016. ¹⁹³ As he was barred under HDB’s rules from concurrently holding a private property (such as the EK Property), he faced pressure from HDB to divest the EK Property. ¹⁹⁴ The Defendant’s case is that the Claimant knew about the HDB flat ¹⁹⁵ and how this meant that the Defendant was under pressure to sell the EK Property. ¹⁹⁶ Specifically, the Defendant pleaded that the Claimant “exploited the Defendant’s situation and threatened” ¹⁹⁷ [emphasis added in italics and bold italics] to refuse signing the OTP – which would have left the Defendant saddled with the EK Property – unless the Defendant signed the Handwritten Note.

(b) Secondly, the Defendant pleaded that aborting the sale “would negatively impact the Defendant as an agent”.197 As alluded to at [155(a)] above, the Defendant highlights that the Claimant had made a host of unreasonable demands on the Buyer which the latter ultimately acceded to, notwithstanding their extraordinary nature. This had prompted the Defendant to give the Buyer “his word, as an agent”197 [emphasis added in italics and bold italics] that upon the Buyer procuring the cashier’s order, the sale would go through. ¹⁹⁸ Having given such an undertaking, the Defendant’s professional reputation would have suffered if the sale were to be aborted. ¹⁹⁹

177 For the reasons below, I find that both factors above fall far short of constituting illegitimate pressure, for purposes of establishing economic duress.

(a) As regards the Claimant’s alleged exploitation of the pressure which the Defendant faced from HDB, it is undisputed that when the Handwritten Note was signed, the Claimant was unaware that the Defendant even owned a HDB flat. ²⁰⁰ The Defendant now admits that the Claimant first came to know of the HDB flat only in 2023, when the Parties underwent mediation for the present dispute. ²⁰¹ Without knowledge of the HDB flat at the point when the Handwritten Note was signed, the Claimant could not have “exploited” this fact to pressure the Defendant. In any case, there is evidence of messages exchanged between the Defendant and his brothers in January 2022, ie, just three months shy of completion of the sale of the EK Property to the Buyer, in which the Defendant said that he was actively contemplating buying another private property (a unit in a condominium development called Belgravia Ace) in his own name. ²⁰² This significantly undermines the credibility of his claims that he felt pressured at that time to divest himself of private properties such as the EK Property.

(b) As regards the purported threat to the Defendant’s professional reputation from the sale being aborted, the Claimant’s evidence ²⁰³ is similarly that he was unaware about the Defendant undertaking to the Buyer about the sale going through. Without the Claimant having known about any such undertaking, the suggestion that he exploited the same to pressure the Defendant is similarly a non-starter. In any case, there is a dearth of objective evidence, whether in the form of messages or other documentary records, supporting the Defendant’s claim that he had given an undertaking to the Buyer that the sale would proceed. Indeed, it is telling that the Buyer’s own AEIC fails to allude to this.

The circumstances above thus cast grave doubts on the Defendant’s claims that he faced any sort of pressure (illegitimate or otherwise), emanating from the Claimant or from any other agent for that matter, to sign the Handwritten Note.

178 I thus conclude that there was no illegitimate pressure exerted on the Defendant when he signed the Handwritten Note. This is sufficient in and of itself to dispose of his claim of economic duress. However, for completeness, I will turn to examine whether the Defendant satisfied the other element of economic duress, being the compulsion of his will.

179 Apart from demonstrating illegitimate pressure, a party claiming economic duress must also show that his will was compelled by that pressure to the point that his assent to the transaction was vitiated. As explained by Lord Scarman in Pao On v Lau Yiu Long [1980] AC 614 (“Pao On”) (at 635):

Lord Scarman then went on to list certain factors that might indicate such compulsion:

180 Taking guidance from the above passage in Pao On, both Prakash J in Tam Tak Chuen (at [62]) and Loh J in E C Investment Holdings (at [44]) distilled the following four factors for assessing if a contracting party’s will had been coerced to the point that his consent could be regarded as effectively vitiated:

(a) whether there was any protest from person allegedly coerced;

(b) whether he had alternatives open to him at the time of the alleged coercion;

(c) whether he was independently advised; and

(d) whether he took steps to avoid the contract that he was allegedly coerced into entering, after having entered into it.

I note that in the present case, factors (a), (c) and (d) are conceivably present: (i) the Defendant protested when he was asked to sign the Handwritten Note, to the point that he and the Claimant descended into an altercation (see [144] above); (ii) the Defendant did not appear to be legally advised when signing the Handwritten Note; and (iii) the Defendant tried to disavow the Handwritten Note just one day after signing it (see [145] above).

181 Still, the list of factors in the preceding paragraph is not a checklist where, the greater the number of ticks, the more likely a finding that the contracting party’s will was coerced. It is evident from Lord Scarman’s description of these factors as “matters … relevant in determining whether [the contracting party] acted voluntarily or not” (in Pao On at 635) that they serve merely as indicators which guide the court in the overarching inquiry of whether the party’s will had indeed been subjugated. The weight commanded by any one factor must depend on the circumstances. Indeed, the facts before me offer an excellent illustration of why the factors (a) and (d) enumerated in the immediately preceding paragraph might be given less weight in the present case.

182 Firstly, as regards the protests by the Defendant when signing the Handwritten Note, the Defendant stresses how he had slammed the table, shouted at the Claimant and was on the verge of punching him when the Claimant suddenly whipped out the Handwritten Note. ²⁰⁴ The Defendant argues that this evinced a “patently distraught” state of emotions, ²⁰⁵ consistent with his will having been coerced. However, I am unconvinced that the Defendant’s emotional outburst should be accorded much weight. Unlike in the case of Tam Tak Chuen, the Claimant did not procure the Defendant’s signature while the latter was in a state of mental disquiet. Rather, the Claimant had walked away from the altercation, giving the Defendant ample space to cool off. It was the Defendant who, after having a change of heart and agreeing to sign the Handwritten Note, called the Claimant back (see [144] above).

183 Next, as regards the Defendant’s purported attempt to disavow the Handwritten Note, it is important to reiterate that when the Defendant sent the message to the Claimant declaring the Handwritten Note to be invalid on account of duress, the Claimant had responded within that very same day saying that if this was the Defendant’s position, the Claimant would also regard the OTP as having been vitiated. The Claimant even went so far as to offer to return the cashier’s order: see at [145] above. It thus appears that the chance arose for the Defendant to make good on his purported disavowal of the Handwritten Note. All he needed to do was accede to the Claimant’s proposal that Parties withdraw from the sale to the Buyer. The Defendant has not explained why, despite the way out having presented itself, he still proceeded with the sale.

184 The Defendant’s subsequent conduct also gives cause for scepticism over his conviction about disavowing the Handwritten Note. On 30 September 2021, ie, about 2½ weeks after the Handwritten Note was signed, the Defendant sent a message to George, in which he told George the “good news” that the EK Property had been sold. Critically, the Defendant’s message stated that upon completion of the sale, the Defendant was going to ensure that the Claimant would hand George the $300,000 contemplated by the Oral AIP. The Defendant’s message to George is extracted below: ²⁰⁶

Clearly, this message from the Defendant shows him affirming, rather than disavowing, the purport of the Handwritten Note (under which George and Jack would each be paid $300,000 after the sale).

185 The Defendant nevertheless contends that his message to George only sought to affirm the portion of the Handwritten Note under which the Claimant would pay $300,000 to George and Jack. The Defendant stresses that his message said nothing about his obligation under the Handwritten Note to pay $300,000 to George and Jack, which the Defendant continues to regard as null and void. ²⁰⁷ However, the Defendant’s rationalisation is plainly unconvincing, especially when one considers the message which George had immediately sent in response to the Defendant’s message extracted above. George’s message is set out below: ²⁰⁸

It is abundantly clear from the second paragraph of George’s message above that his impression of the “good news” was that the full $600,000 was going to be paid, as contemplated by the Oral AIP. Yet, the Defendant said nothing to disabuse George of this impression.

186 The factor which I do find to be particularly material on the facts of this case is (b) at [180] above, ie, whether the person claiming to have been coerced had any alternatives open to him at the time of the alleged coercion. In the present case, signing the Handwritten Note was clearly not the only course available to the Defendant. He concedes that a further alternative would have been to take the Claimant to court to compel the sale. ²⁰⁹ He also admits that he could simply have elected to not proceed with the sale. ²¹⁰ For the latter option, the Defendant could have continued to lease out the EK Property. This then prompts the obvious question: Why did the Defendant not simply reject the Handwritten Note and walk away from the sale to the Buyer?

187 The answer to this question is obvious. The Defendant capitulated in signing the Handwritten Note not because he had no other choice but because he was bent on making a killing from the sale of the EK Property. As he explained in his AEIC, the Defendant was anxious to close the deal as the price of $5m was “far above market value” ²¹¹ – more than 10% above the bank valuation of $4.5m. ²¹² In a WhatsApp message that the Defendant sent the Claimant on 2 September 2021, he told the Claimant that this was a “windfall offer” [emphasis added]. ²¹³ When the Claimant responded frostily that he wanted the payments to George and Jack to first be addressed (see message at [173] above), the Defendant’s exasperation was palpable. On 5 September 2021, the Defendant sent a message to the Claimant complaining about the latter’s reticence despite the Defendant having finally found a “sucker” willing to pay $5m for the EK Property: ²¹⁴

When the Defendant was cross-examined about his use of the term “sucker”, he explained: “I’m just trying to elaborate to [the Claimant] that such a good deal, should not miss it, just take it.” ²¹⁵

188 The facts are thus entirely consistent with a state of affairs where the Defendant found the sale price so irresistible that he agreed (albeit grudgingly) to take a haircut of $300,000 – being his share of the payment under the Handwritten Note – to secure the Claimant’s concurrence. The Defendant should not be allowed to now raise the doctrine of economic duress to wriggle out of keeping to his word.

189 In light of the considerations above, I reject the Defendant’s contentions that his will had been coerced when he signed the Handwritten Note.

190 Given my findings above, the issue of causation (ie, whether the Defendant would have signed the Handwritten Note but for the purported duress exerted by the Claimant) is moot.

191 Accordingly, the Defendant’s claim of economic duress fails. The validity of the Handwritten Note remains unimpeached.

192 The terms of the Handwritten Note should thus be honoured. It was validly concluded, having been supported by both an intention to create legal relations and consideration. Furthermore, the Defendant’s claims about the Handwritten Note having been vitiated by economic duress are without merit.

193 The Defendant is thus obliged to set aside $600,000 from the sale proceeds of the EK Property, from which $300,000 is to be paid to George and $300,000 is to be paid to Jack. I consequently grant the prayers sought by the Claimant in his Statement of Claim, set out at [148] above. Consequentially, the Defendant’s prayer for half of the $600,000 in the SCB Joint Account to be released to him (see [149] above) is dismissed – the entire sum of $600,000 should go to George and Jack.

194 Before leaving the issue of the Handwritten Note, I should touch on a further argument that the Defendant has raised extremely late in the day – in his further reply closing submissions ²¹⁶ – being that the Claimant lacks the locus standi to enforce the Handwritten Note because it confers a benefit not on him but on George and Jack. With respect, this submission is misguided. It is trite that a party can enter into a contract to confer a benefit on persons other than himself. It is open to such a party to then enforce that contract, by way of specific performance, which is effectively what the Claimant seeks to do here.

195 As stated at [3(b)] above, the Far East Property was bequeathed by the Testatrix to the Parties and Dione in three equal shares. In his AEIC, the Defendant explained that the Far East Property, which had been leased to commercial tenants both before and after the Testatrix’ death, was rented out for the following periods: ²¹⁷

196 After the Testatrix died on 21 December 2012, the Defendant began collecting rent from the Far East Property. ²¹⁸ He admits that the rent which he collected from the Far East Property was paid into his personal bank account. ²¹⁹ Nevertheless, there was a period when the rent was paid into a bank account jointly held by the Claimant, the Defendant and Dione (“Far East Bank Account”). ²²⁰ According to the Claimant, the rent for the months September 2017 to January 2018 were paid into the Far East Bank Account. ²²¹

197 According to the Claimant, the Parties and Dione had agreed to deposit the Far East Property’s rental proceeds into the Far East Bank Account. ²²² The Claimant thus alleges that the Defendant failed to properly account for the rental proceeds for those periods when they were not paid into the Far East bank Account but into the Defendant’s personal bank account instead, namely: (a) January 2013 to August 2017; ²²³ and (b) from February 2018 onwards. ²²⁴ As for the rental proceeds for September 2017 to January 2018 that were paid into the Far East Bank Account, the Claimant says that these were used to pay for the Far East Property’s monthly maintenance fees and property tax. ²²⁵

198 The Claimant thus seeks an account from the Defendant of the rental proceeds which the latter collected from the Far East Property, from 1 January 2013 to date, as well as payment of the Claimant’s one-third share of those proceeds. In seeking an account, the Claimant has sought to cast doubts on the veracity of the dates listed in the Defendant’s AEIC, as regards the periods when the Far East Property was allegedly rented out (see [195] above). The Claimant affirms that he had made periodic visits to the Far East Property, only to find that it was occupied by a commercial tenant until at least 2020. ²²⁶ This appears to be corroborated by the Defendant own testimony in cross-examination, where he admitted that the Far East Property was rented out from September 2018 to December 2022 but he did not inform the other beneficial owners of this. ²²⁷

199 The Defendant admits that he has been managing the Far East Property and collecting rent from it, but only from the second tenancy at [195(b)] above, ie, from August 2013 onwards. ²²⁸ The Defendant also claims that any rent collected by him should be set off against the maintenance fees and property tax in respect of the Far East Property, ²²⁹ for which he has been bearing the brunt. ²³⁰ Specifically, the Defendant claims that he has been paying for the Far East Property’s maintenance fees and property tax from as far back as December 2012 ²³¹ (when the Testatrix died). The Defendant also claims that a commission of $5,250 was due to him, in his capacity as the property agent who procured the first and second tenancies at [195(a)–(b)] above. ²³² The Defendant calculates that although he had collected rent from the Far East Property totalling $126,000, the balance after deductions for property tax, maintenance fees and his commission would be in the region of only $37,673. ²³³

200 Given the Defendant’s position that any rental proceeds from the Far East Property collected by him should be set off against the monthly maintenance fees and property tax paid by him, he now seeks an account by the Claimant of the Far East Property’s maintenance fees and property tax. ²³⁴ In making this claim, the Defendant alleges the following: ²³⁵

(a) The maintenance invoices were sent to the Claimant but the latter failed to furnish the Defendant with the invoices in respect of 33 months.

(b) The property tax statements were sent to Dione but she has not furnished the Defendant with the same.

201 The starting point is that the Defendant admits to the following:

(a) He has been collecting rent from the Far East Property and paying the same into his personal bank account, save for those months when they were paid into the Far East Bank Account (see [196] above).

(b) He has not given an account of the rental proceeds to the other beneficial owners of the property, including the Claimant. ²³⁶

Consequently, I agree that the Defendant should, by virtue of s 73A CLPA (see [59] above), be made to furnish an account of the Claimant’s share of the rent collected by him.

202 The Defendant objects to providing an account as he claims that he does not possess the full set of maintenance fee invoices and property tax statements in respect of the Far East Property – the former having been sent to the Claimant and the latter having been sent to Dione (see [200] above). Without these records, the Defendant says that he is unable to calculate the appropriate amounts due to the Claimant and Dione, under the account to be furnished. ²³⁷ I reject this submission, for the following reasons:

(a) For the Defendant to provide an account of the rental proceeds, he only needs to know what rent he has received and what property tax and maintenance he himself has paid – all of which would be within his knowledge. For payments of maintenance and property tax not made by him, eg, those made by the Claimant or Dione, the Defendant is under no obligation to provide an account for them. ²³⁸

(b) Furthermore, the Defendant claims that he has been paying for the Far East Property’s maintenance fees and property tax since December 2012: see [199] above. If so, he must know how much has been paid in maintenance fees and property tax (since he was the one footing the bill). It is thus difficult to discern the reason for the Defendant’s insistence on having the maintenance fee invoices and property tax statements, before he furnishes an account. ²³⁹

203 I thus grant the remedies sought by the Claimant in respect of the Far East Property, namely: ²⁴⁰

(a) The Defendant is to furnish an account of all rent and other monies which he has collected from the Far East Property, from 1 January 2013 to the date of this order (I note the Defendant has not raised the defence of time bar, in his pleadings or closing submissions, against the claim for an account in respect of the Far East Property).

(b) Upon taking of the account, the Defendant is to then pay the Claimant the latter’s one-third share of the rent collected by the Defendant, after permissible deductions (including any maintenance fees and property tax paid by the Defendant).

204 I now turn to the Defendant’s claim for the Claimant to furnish an account of the maintenance fees and property tax in respect of the Far East Property. I dismiss this claim for the following reasons. For a start, it is unclear why the Defendant is asking the Claimant to furnish an account of the property tax statements when these were sent to Dione (see [200(b)] above). More importantly, the Defendant claims that he has been paying the maintenance fees and property tax for the Far East Property from as far back as December 2012 (see [199] above). If so, the details of these payments would, by the Defendant’s own case, be within his knowledge. I thus see little reason for him to ask the Claimant to provide an account of these payments.

205 Both the Parties are executors and beneficiaries of the Estate. As executors, they each have a responsibility to maintain and furnish proper accounts of the Estate’s assets. As beneficiaries, they each have the right to seek an account from the other, in the latter’s capacity as executor. Pursuant to these rights and responsibilities, each of the Parties has made the following claims against the other for an account.

(a) The Defendant seeks an account from the Claimant of the following (see [11] above):

(i) the EK Shortfall;

(ii) the Gold Investment; and

(iii) the blue attaché case and its contents.

(b) The Parties each also seek an account from the other in respect of the balances in various bank accounts in which the Testatrix was a joint account holder (see [12] above).

206 Before proceeding to canvass these claims, it is apposite at this juncture to set out the legal principles governing the duty of executors (and trustees generally) to maintain and furnish accounts. In Baker, Michael A v BCS Business Consulting Services Pte Ltd [2023] 1 SLR 35 (“Baker”), the Court of Appeal explained why that duty has been placed on trustees (at [25]):

207 As regards the scope of the duty to maintain and furnish accounts, the Court of Appeal in Foo Jee Seng v Foo Jhee Tuang [2012] 4 SLR 339 (“Foo Jee Seng (CA)”) explained (at [86]): “It is trite law that trustees are under a duty to keep account of the trusts and to allow the beneficiaries to inspect them as requested”. The Court of Appeal cited Plumer MR’s holding from Pearse v Green (1819) 1 Jac & W 135; 37 ER 327 that “[i]t is the first duty of an accounting party, whether an agent, trustee, a receiver or executor … to be constantly ready with his accounts.” The Court of Appeal also explained that beneficiaries are entitled to seek an account without having to allege any breach of fiduciary duties by the trustee (at [87]):

It bears mentioning that the passage from the Court of Appeal’s judgment extracted above alludes to the entitlement of the right to an account being “within proper bounds”. In this respect, George Wei J explained in Foo Jee Boo v Foo Jhee Tuang [2016] SGHC 260 (at [81]) that an account may not be ordered “where it would be oppressive to require the executor to so account, or for some other good reason, the court in its discretion thinks it wrong to make an order”.

208 Claims for an account by the trustee can either be on a common basis or a wilful default basis. As explained by Vinodh Coomaraswamy J in Lim Ah Leh v Heng Fock Lin [2018] SGHC 156 (“Lim Ah Leh (HC)”) at [191]:

To obtain an account on a wilful default basis, a beneficiary must establish that the trustee committed at least one instance of wilful default which caused loss to the trust property: Lim Ah Leh (HC) at [192(c)]. In contrast, the right to an account on a common basis is “axiomatic”: Lim Ah Leh (HC) at [192(a)].

209 Although not explicitly stated in their pleadings, both sides are seeking accounts on a common basis – they have not pleaded any instance of wilful default on the part of the other side.

210 I begin with the Defendant’s claims for the Claimant to furnish accounts in respect of the items at [11] above. To recapitulate, these items are:

(a) the EK Shortfall;

(b) the Gold Investment; and

(c) the blue attaché case and its contents.

211 Each of these three items are dealt with sequentially below.

212 As explained at [5] above, the Will provided that the Testatrix’s monies were to be applied towards the progress payments for the EK Property until completion of its construction, with the balance of these monies to be divided between the beneficiaries thereafter. The EK Shortfall, being the shortfall should these monies be insufficient to meet the progress payments, was to be met from the net rental proceeds generated by the Far East Property and the Springdale Condo.

213 As explained at [4] above, the progress payments towards the EK Property commenced even before the Testatrix’s passed away, with the Estate continuing to make the progress payments even after her death on 21 December 2012. On 25 June 2014 (about 1½ years after the Testatrix’s demise), the Claimant reported to the beneficiaries that the EK Shortfall was $265,600. The Defendant paid $132,800 to the Claimant to cover half of this amount, with the Claimant bearing the other half. ²⁴¹

214 A little over five months after that, on 4 December 2014, the final progress payment towards the EK Property was made. ²⁴² Thereafter, the Defendant pressed the Claimant for an account of how he arrived at the figure of $265,600. Consequently, at some point between 2015 and 2017, the Claimant prepared a breakdown showing how he arrived at the $265,600 figure. ²⁴³ The Claimant’s efforts culminated in a single-page summary, exhibited at p 270 of his AEIC, which he handed to the Defendant on 19 July 2018. ²⁴⁴

215 The Defendant claims that when he was informed on 25 June 2014 that the EK Shortfall was $265,600, he was shocked as he was under the impression that the arrangements in the Will (set out at [5] above) would have sufficed to completely cover the EK Property’s progress payments (and thereby extinguish the EK Shortfall). ²⁴⁵ The Defendant claims that this was why he had subsequently asked the Claimant for an account of the EK Shortfall, despite agreeing to first pay his half share of the reported figure of $132,800 in the interim. ²⁴⁶ The Defendant complains that the single-page summary which the Claimant eventually rendered on 19 July 2018 was too bare to constitute a proper account. The Defendant thus seeks a proper account of the EK Shortfall ²⁴⁷ and – if that exercise should demonstrate that the EK Shortfall no longer existed – a refund of the $132,800 which he paid. ²⁴⁸

216 The Claimant submits that the Defendant is no longer entitled to an account of the EK Shortfall because such an account had already been rendered and settled on 3 December 2014, ²⁴⁹ being the day before the final progress payment was made on 4 December 2014 (see [214] above). In support of his submission, the Claimant refers to the following WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties on 3 December 2014: ²⁵⁰

217 The messages above evince the following:

(a) The Defendant had asked for an account of the EK Shortfall on 3 December 2014 and, in doing so, instructed the Claimant on the formula by which the EK Shortfall was to be calculated (message at 11.08am).

(b) The Claimant complied with the Defendant’s instructions, arriving at a figure of $271,020 (message at 11.19am). In doing so, the Claimant had on his own volition made certain corrections to the Defendant’s figures (message at 11.34am), which the Defendant expressed gratitude for (message at 2.03pm).

(c) The Defendant accepted the Claimant’s account, thanking the latter for his “detail [sic] checking” (message at 2.03pm), notwithstanding that the shortfall figure of $271,020 was slightly higher than the figure of $265,600 rendered by the Claimant a few months earlier in June 2014 (referred to at [213] above).

218 The Claimant explains that the figure of $271,020 in the WhatsApp message above was rendered without any explanation or documentation as the Claimant had no reason to provide the same. After all, it was the Defendant who provided the formula for calculating the EK Shortfall and the Parties still trusted each other at that time. ²⁵¹ The Claimant maintains that it was only after their relationship soured that the Defendant started pressing the Claimant for another account, ²⁵² presumably culminating in the Claimant having to prepare the single-page summary furnished on 19 July 2018 (referred to at [214] above).

219 Critically, the Claimant also pleaded that the Defendant’s claim for an account of the EK Shortfall is time-barred. ²⁵³

220 The starting position is that the Claimant was liable to provide the Defendant with an account of the EK Shortfall. After all, the Claimant had a hand (in his capacity as executor) in managing the Estate’s assets that were applied towards covering the EK Property’s progress payments. The crux is whether, as the Claimant now submits, the account had already been settled.

221 Disregarding the factual backdrop, one could well appreciate why a beneficiary might say that the Claimant has yet to furnish a sufficient account:

(a) The Claimant admits that he had only given a simple estimation of the EK Shortfall amount. ²⁵⁴ He explains that his account was a relatively simple one as he had limited accounting knowledge. ²⁵⁵ Nevertheless, a trustee’s lack of accounting knowledge is no excuse for not preparing a proper account, given that “there is nothing particularly sophisticated about the essential task of a trustee, whether professional or lay, in documenting expenses”: Baker at [30]. After all, the court has the discretion to “make some allowances for a lay trustee’s accounting”: Baker at [31]. In light of these principles, one may well contend that both the breakdown provided by the Claimant in his WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014 (see message at 11.19am, at [216] above) and the single-page breakdown subsequently furnished by him on 19 July 2018 (at [213] above) left much to be desired, detail-wise.

(b) Furthermore, as the Court of Appeal in Baker explained (at [30]), a trustee providing an account needs to break down and explain the expenses as well as “substantiate the same with sufficient supporting evidence, oral or documentary depending on the nature and quantum of such expenses” [emphasis added]. Intuitively, the larger the sums in the account, the greater the required level of documentary substantiation. Here, the size of the EK Shortfall was not insignificant, standing at $265,600. Yet, the Claimant did not furnish supporting documents. ²⁵⁶

222 Nonetheless, in so far as the account provided by the Claimant in his WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014 is concerned, while the level of detail and documentation was undoubtedly sparse, there is some force to the argument that this was still a sufficient account, from the perspective of the Defendant:

(a) As a matter of principle, the degree of explanatory detail and documentary substantiation required of an account must be informed by the context. In the present case, the required level of detail was arguably attenuated by the fact that the Defendant was intimately familiar with how the EK Shortfall was to be calculated. After all, it was the Defendant who had instructed the Claimant on the steps for calculating the EK Shortfall (see message at 11.08am, at [216] above).

(b) Furthermore, while no supporting documentation was furnished by the Claimant when rendering the account in the WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014, the sole consumer for whom the account was prepared was a co-executor himself (ie, the Defendant). The documents at the disposal of a person in such a capacity must inform the level of documentation that needs to accompany the account furnished to him.

223 An analogy can perhaps be drawn with Lim Ah Leh (HC), where Coomaraswamy J noted (at [248]) that “the plaintiff was aware of the key features of what happened to his money”, such that “ordering the defendant to render an account would serve no useful purpose”. In drawing this conclusion, Coomaraswamy J noted (at [249]–[250]) that the plaintiff played an active role in instructing the defendant on the trades to be made using the former’s monies, with the plaintiff even advising the defendant on the valuation of a property bought using these monies. Admittedly, the observations in Lim Ah Leh (HC) centred not so much on whether an account furnished was sufficiently detailed as to constitute a proper account (being the point I am discussing here) but on whether an account was even necessary. Nonetheless, if the level of knowledge possessed by the intended consumer of the account is relevant to the latter context, I see no reason why it cannot be relevant to the former. As such, I am somewhat sympathetic to the Claimant’s position that, given the Defendant’s deep acquaintance with the line items underlying the EK Shortfall (the formula for which had been dictated by Defendant himself), the account rendered by the Claimant in the WhatsApp on 3 December 2014 was sufficient.

224 More importantly, even if the Defendant had been entitled to reject the account provided in the Claimant’s WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014 on account of it being too sparse and demand for one with greater detail, that is not what happened. Rather, the WhatsApp messages at [216] above show that the Defendant accepted the account provided on 3 December 2014. This is significant when one considers the factual background.

(a) To recapitulate, the Claimant had on 25 June 2014 informed the Defendant that the EK Shortfall was $265,600 (see [213] above). The Defendant claims that he was “shocked” by this figure but nevertheless paid him $132,800 first, being the Defendants half share of the $265,600 (see [215] above).

(b) About five months after this, the Claimant sent the Defendant the WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014 providing an account of the EK Shortfall. The figure in this account, which stood at $271,020 (see message at 11.19am, at [216] above), was quite close to the figure of $265,600 reported by the Claimant on 25 June 2014. Critically, the WhatsApp messages exchanged on 3 December 2014 fail to disclose any hint of the Defendant still being “shocked” by the account rendered (even if he was indeed shocked five months earlier on 25 June 2014). Clearly, the Defendant was no longer shocked but was satisfied with the account provided by the WhatsApp message on 3 December 2014, as seen in his response thanking the Claimant for his “detail [sic] checking”.

(c) For a significant duration after that, the Defendant did not ask for any further explanation or documentation. As the Claimant points out, it was only after the relationship between the Parties deteriorated that the Defendant began pressing the Claimant for another account. ²⁵⁷ Presumably, this led to the Claimant having to embark on preparing a further account, sometime between 2015 and 2017, culminating in the single-page summary rendered on 19 July 2018 (see [214] above).

Given the chronology above, I am inclined towards the view that the account of the EK Shortfall should on balance be regarded as having been settled by the WhatsApp message of 3 December 2014. The Defendant thus had no basis to seek another account from the Claimant: see Chng Weng Wah v Goh Bak Heng [2016] 2 SLR 464 at [38]–[39].

225 In the event that I am wrong in my analysis above and the Claimant is regarded as not having provided a proper account of the EK Shortfall to date, I agree with the Claimant that the claim for an account of the EK Shortfall is time-barred. The Claimant relies – rightfully in my view – on s 6(2) of the Limitation Act 1959 (2020 Rev Ed) (“Limitation Act”), ²⁵⁸ which states that “[a]n action for an account shall not be brought in respect of any matter which arose more than 6 years before the commencement of the action”.

226 In examining the Claimant’s defence of time bar, it is necessary to first look at the nature of the Defendant’s claim for an account of the EK Shortfall. This claim seeks “[a]n order that an account be taken, and the Claimant do provide and furnish an account (with supporting documents) of … calculation of the EK Shortfall Amount”. ²⁵⁹ The claim is thus couched somewhat differently from the relatively straightforward scenario where the beneficiary simply seeks an account of the trust assets. Nevertheless, the Defendant’s claim for an account of the EK Shortfall is still, at its essence, a claim for an account of the Estate assets – specifically those assets of the Estate applied towards the progress payments for the EK Property. It was only after the Estate’s assets were used to discharge the progress payments – to the maximum extent possible under the means dictated by the Will at [5] above – that the final figure for the EK Shortfall crystallised. As such, in asking for an account of the EK Shortfall, the Defendant is for all intents and purposes demanding an account of the Estate assets that were applied towards the progress payments. Such an account would in turn allow him to tell if any assets of the Estate had not been duly applied towards the progress payments as directed by the Will.

227 Given the premise defined in the preceding paragraph, when does the limitation period governing the claim for an account to be furnished in respect of the EK Shortfall begin to run? In Ang Toon Teck v Ang Poon Sin [1998] SGHC 67 (“Ang Toon Teck”), Prakash J held that a trustee’s liability to furnish an account of trust assets arises from the point he receives the trust assets (see also Lim Ah Leh (HC) at [175]–[176]). The complication which presents itself in the present case relates to when the Estate assets applied towards the EK Property’s progress payments was received by the Claimant (in his capacity as executor). As explained at [5] above, the Will dictated that the Estate’s assets to be applied towards discharging the progress payments included not only the Testatrix’s monies vesting in the Estate as at the point of her death (in December 2012) but also rental proceeds from the Far East Property and Springdale Condo. These proceeds would have continued to vest in the Estate – and thus be received by the Claimant in his capacity as executor – long after the Testatrix’s death. In fact, the rental proceeds used to discharge the progress payments could theoretically have been received by the Claimant (as executor) as late as around the point when the final progress payment was made on 4 December 2014 (see [214] above), when the amount of the EK Shortfall finally crystallised. Nevertheless, the evidence does not allow one to confirm if that had indeed been the case. Nevertheless, taking the Defendant’s case at its highest and pegging the start of the six-year limitation period at the latest possible point, ie, 4 December 2014 (the Claimant appears to have given the Defendant the benefit of the doubt by adopting this date as the starting point as well ²⁶⁰ ), the Defendant’s claim for an account would still be time-barred. The Defendant’s claim for an account was filed only in August 2023 – well beyond the six-year mark.

228 Nevertheless, the Defendant relies on the case of Topham v Braddick [1809] 1 Taunt 571 (“Topham”) for the proposition that “a cause of action for an account can arise at a later date than the date of receipt of the assets, if it is expressly or impliedly agreed to that effect”. ²⁶¹ Topham involved a case where a third party and the defendant undertook to render to the plaintiffs an account of the sale of certain goods, as and when the plaintiffs requested (at 572). It was held that the cause of action for an account accrued only at the point when the plaintiffs requested for an account. Reverting to the present case, the Defendant argues that he too had a similar agreement with the Claimant, under which the latter would provide an account upon the Defendant demanding for one. As evidence of this agreement, the Defendant relies on the WhatsApp messages exchanged between the Parties on 3 December 2014 at 10.25am, extracted at [216] above. For ease of reference, I reproduce the relevant messages here:

According to the Defendant, the Claimant’s response “Soon” constituted an agreement by the Claimant to furnish an account at a later date, on demand by the Defendant. The Defendant claims that such a demand was in fact made by him in 2018. Specifically, the Defendant claims that after he received the single-page summary on 19 July 2018 (alluded to at [214] above) – which he found to be overly sparse – he made a demand on 3 August 2018 that the Claimant provide him with a proper account of the EK Shortfall. The Defendant accordingly contends that his cause of action for an account of the EK Shortfall accrued – and the six-year limitation period consequently started to run – only as of the date of his demand on 3 August 2018. ²⁶²

229 I reject the Defendant’s contention that there was an agreement between him and the Claimant for the latter to furnish an account at a later date. Extrapolating the Claimant’s WhatsApp message “Soon” to infer such an agreement would be to read too much into that single word. The Claimant was simply conveying that he would give the account “Soon”, ²⁶³ which he did – this being the account in his WhatsApp message sent less than an hour after that, at 11.19am (extracted at [216] above).

230 I thus conclude that the limitation period for the claim seeking an account of the EK Shortfall would have started running no later than on 4 December 2014, when the final progress payment for the EK Property was paid from the Estate’s assets and the final quantum of the EK Shortfall crystallised. The fact that a subsequent demand for an account may have been made after that did not reset the six-year countdown timer. As observed by the Prakash J in Ang Toon Teck (at [66]):

I thus hold that the Defendant’s claim for an account of the EK Shortfall is time-barred and I dismiss it.

231 Before leaving this issue, I should point out that the Defendant has also sought an account from the Claimant as regards the financial contributions by Dione and Joanne (if any) towards the EK Shortfall. ²⁶⁴ I dismiss this claim as the Defendant’s affidavits and submissions are bereft of any reference as to when and how Dione and Joanne might have contributed to the EK Shortfall.

232 I now turn to the two other items for which the Defendant seeks an account from the Claimant, being the Gold Investment and the blue attaché case.

233 As stated at [11(ii)] above, the Defendant seeks an account of the Gold Investment, being the Testatrix’s investment in a gold investment company called Genneva Pte Ltd. The investment was made by the Testatrix sometime between 2010 and 2012, at the Claimant’s suggestion. ²⁶⁵

234 The Parties’ submissions in respect of the Gold Investment are set out below:

(a) The Defendant contends that the Claimant failed to account for the returns from the Gold Investment despite having been the person managing it. In particular, the Defendant claims that these returns could have been applied towards reducing the EK Shortfall. ²⁶⁶ The Defendant thus seeks an order that the Claimant account for the Gold Investment. ²⁶⁷

(b) The Claimant explains that when the Testatrix was alive, she had instructed him to liquidate the Gold Investment so that she could use the proceeds to purchase the EK Property. ²⁶⁸ The Claimant affirms that he had executed these instructions and accounted for the proceeds to the Testatrix even before she died. He thus maintains that he is no longer liable to account to the Estate’s beneficiaries for the Gold Investment. ²⁶⁹ He also explains that he is unable to furnish any documents relating to the Gold Investment as he had furnished the same to the Testatrix, after liquidating it at her behest. ²⁷⁰ Further, as with the Defendant’s claim for an account of the EK Shortfall, the Claimant contends that the claim for an account of the Gold Investment is time-barred. ²⁷¹

235 Having considered the evidence, I dismiss the Defendant’s claim for an account of the Gold Investment. The Claimant’s evidence – that he liquidated the Gold Investment and applied the proceeds to purposes dictated by the Testatrix while she was alive – stands unchallenged. That Defendant’s counsel did not challenge the Claimant on this point is apparent from the following extract of the transcripts of the Claimant’s cross-examination: ²⁷²

Accepting the Claimant’s evidence as true, the Gold Investment would not form part of the Estate. His obligation as an executor to account for the Estate’s assets would consequently not extend to the Gold Investment. The issue of time bar thus does not even arise.

236 I am mindful that the Claimant is unable to produce any records showing that the Gold Investment had indeed been liquidated while the Testatrix was alive. ²⁷³ However, given that the Defendant’s claim for an account of the Gold Investment was brought more than 10 years after the Testatrix’s death, some gaps in the documentary evidence is not unexpected.

237 I thus dismiss the Defendant’s claim for an account of the Gold Investment.

238 As stated at [11(iii)] above, the Defendant seeks an account of the Testatrix's blue attaché case.

239 The Defendant contends that the blue attaché case contained the Testatrix’s jewellery and valuables and was stored in her wardrobe at the Springdale Condo, where she had resided with Jack until she died. ²⁷⁴ The Claimant similarly accepts that the blue attaché case contained the Testatrix’s jewellery and bank account statements and was kept in the Springdale Condo. ²⁷⁵ The Parties’ submissions in respect of the blue attaché case are set out below:

(a) The Defendant claims that both the Claimant and George went to the Springdale Condo on the night of the Testatrix’s death to collect her clothes. Thereafter, the blue attaché case, which had been in her wardrobe all along, suddenly went missing. The Defendant thus contends that the blue attaché would have last been in the possession of either the Claimant, George or Jack. ²⁷⁶ The Defendant thus seeks an order that the Claimant provides an account of the blue attaché case and its contents. ²⁷⁷

(b) The Claimant’s position is that he has not seen the blue attaché case since the Testatrix’s passing and that he neither possesses it nor knows of its whereabouts. ²⁷⁸ The Claimant also points out that the Defendant, despite being an executor himself, had never asked about the blue attaché case prior to the commencement of these proceedings. ²⁷⁹

240 In my view, the Defendant’s claim for the Claimant to furnish an account of the blue attaché case and its contents should be granted.

241 As an executor, the Claimant is obliged to provide an account of the Estate’s assets. I do not think he is entitled to wash his hands of the responsibility to provide such an account – particularly where the asset in issue is one of such value as the blue attaché case (the Claimant himself acknowledges that it contained jewellery) – simply with a blithe statement that he does not know where the asset is. The Claimant should at least provide an account explaining the steps which he took to trace the whereabouts of the blue attaché case, including any inquiries which he might have directed to George and Jack. If the blue attaché case is indeed lost, the Claimant’s account should set out what remedial actions he had taken (eg, whether he had lodged a police report) and the outcome of those actions.

242 The Claimant highlights that the Defendant made no meaningful effort to locate the blue attaché case, despite the Defendant being an executor himself. In particular, the Defendant never bothered to ask George or Jack about the blue attaché case ²⁸⁰ and did not see fit to make a police report about its missing contents. ²⁸¹ In my view, while these factors may arguably prove relevant should the Defendant seek to rely on the Claimant’s account to say that the Claimant breached his duty (as executor) to the Defendant (as beneficiary), they do not absolve the Claimant from discharging the anterior obligation to first provide that account.

243 The Parties have also made claims in respect of the balances in various joint bank accounts, in which the Testatrix was one of the account holders, which they say form part of the Estate. To recapitulate:

(a) The Claimant seeks an account from the Defendant of the balances in two bank accounts (see [12(a)] above):

(i) the CIMB Joint Account, which was held jointly in the names of the Testatrix and the Defendant; and

(ii) the DBS Joint Account, which was held jointly in the names of the Testatrix, the Defendant and his son.

Both bank accounts above are collectively referred in this judgment as the “CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts”.

(b) The Defendant, on his part, also seeks an account from the Claimant of the balances in various joint bank accounts (see [12(b)] above).

244 I first deal with the Claimant’s claim, followed by the claim of the Defendant.

245 The CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts were bank accounts in which the Testatrix was a joint account holder. The CIMB Joint Account had one other joint account holder (the Defendant), while the DBS Joint Account had two other joint account holders (the Defendant and his son). According to the Claimant, he found out about these two joint accounts after his lawyers wrote to the relevant banks to inquire about accounts which the Testatrix might have held with them. ²⁸² After the banks reverted with details of the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts, the Claimant wrote to the Defendant asking him to account for these two joint accounts. When the Defendant refused, ²⁸³ the Claimant brought the present claims for him to furnish an account for both joint accounts. ²⁸⁴

246 The Defendant’s case is that the Testatrix never deposited any of her monies into the CIMB Joint Account ²⁸⁵ or the DBS Joint Account. ²⁸⁶ He claims that he had included the Testatrix’s name as a joint account holder for the CIMB Joint Account as he was previously a bankrupt and needed to ride on her status (the Testatrix being a premium bank customer) when dealing with the bank. ²⁸⁷ As regards the DBS Joint Account, the Defendant claims that the Testatrix’s name was added as a formality, ²⁸⁸ consistent with what he says was the family’s practice of inserting the Testatrix as a joint account holder of bank accounts held by her children and grandchildren, despite the Testatrix not having deposited her own funds into the bank accounts concerned. ²⁸⁹ The Claimant, on his part, submits that the Defendant’s explanations for why the Testatrix’s name had been included as a joint account holder are unconvincing. ²⁹⁰

247 The Claimant’s claim that the Defendant accounts for the balances in the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts hinges on whether the right of survivorship operated to extinguish any benefit which the Testatrix may have had in these balances, upon her death. If it did, the benefit of the entire bank account balance would devolve to the surviving account holder(s) and cease to form part of the Estate upon the Testatrix’s death. That would in turn defeat the Claimant’s claim that the Defendant accounts for the balances in these bank accounts, as the Defendant’s duty (as executor) to account relates only to assets of the Estate.

248 The right of survivorship arises in a joint tenancy and not a tenancy in common. In Estate of Yang Chun (Mrs) née Sun Hui Min, deceased v Yang Chia-Yin [2019] 5 SLR 593 (“Estate of Yang Chun”), Ang Cheng Hock JC (as he then was) explained the distinction between both types of interests (at [52]):

It is trite that joint bank accounts may similarly embody joint tenancies under which the right of survivorship operates: Estate of Yang Chun at [53].

249 If the terms governing a joint bank account dictate that the demise of an account holder results in the surviving account holder becoming legally entitled to deal with the entire account balance – as is typically the case for joint bank accounts – this would imply a joint tenancy at law (embodying the right of survivorship at law). In line with the maxim that equity follows the law, equity will as a starting point regard joint tenants of the legal interest as joint tenants of the beneficial interest as well: Khoo Phaik Ean Patricia v Khoo Phaik Eng Katherine [2025] 1 SLR 758 (“Patricia Khoo (CA)”) at [56]. Accordingly, there is a starting presumption in the case of joint bank accounts that the right of survivorship operates not only at law but also in equity, where the death of one account holder results in both the legal and beneficial interest in the account balance devolving to the surviving account holder: see Collars Muriel Esther de Jesus v Sandra Audrey Jude Collars [2008] SGHC 110 (“Collars v Collars”) at [30].

250 Nevertheless, the starting presumption that a joint tenancy at law is also a joint tenancy in equity is “readily displaced by any of a number of contra-indications that, regardless of the legal joint tenancy, equitable ownership was intended to take the form of a [tenancy in common]”: Patricia Khoo (CA) at [56]. For example:

(a) If there is evidence indicating that the deceased did not intend for his share of the balance in the joint bank account to devolve to the surviving account holder upon the deceased’s demise, a resulting trust may arise under which the surviving account holder holds the deceased’s share of the account balance on trust for the latter’s estate: see Estate of Yang Chun at [54].

(b) Where there is a dearth of evidence allowing the court to infer the intention in (a) above, there may still be circumstances allowing the court to presume a resulting trust: Estate of Yang Chun at [55]. The presumption may arise if devolution of the deceased’s beneficial interest in the account balance to the surviving joint account holder results in the latter getting a benefit for which he has provided no consideration. Consequently, whether a resulting trust may be presumed in the context of a joint bank account often hinges on the respective account holders’ contributions to the bank balance. To take an example, if the account balance was funded entirely by the deceased account holder, equity may presume that the surviving account holder holds the account balance on resulting trust for the deceased’s estate, notwithstanding the operation of the right of survivorship at law.

In respect of (b) above, it is also important to note that a presumption of resulting trust may be countered by evidence supporting a presumption of advancement, by which the deceased is presumed to have intended for the benefit of his share of the account balance to devolve to the surviving account holder (notwithstanding the lack of consideration emanating from the latter): Patricia Khoo (CA) at [78(b)]. The presumption of advancement may arise if the relationship between the account holders falls within certain categories of familial ties where that presumption has been held to arise, although the strength of that presumption “must vary according to the facts of the case and the contemporary community attitudes and norms”: Lau Siew Kim v Yeo Guan Chye Terence [2008] 2 SLR(R) 108 at [46].

251 I now apply the above principles to the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts. At the outset, I observe that the balance in both joint accounts appear to have been held by way of joint tenancies at law, where the demise of one account holder leaves the surviving account holder(s) with the legal right to deal with the entire balance:

(a) As regards the DBS Joint Account, DBS had written to the Claimant’s solicitors stating: “Please note that for joint account(s), the surviving operator(s) is/ are entitled to claim the available funds in the account(s)”. ²⁹¹

(b) For the CIMB Joint Account, the same position can be inferred from cl 10.2(a) of CIMB Bank’s Terms and Conditions Governing the Operations of Deposit Accounts, which stated: “Upon notice of the death of any one of the Joint Account holders … the Bank shall be entitled to pay the credit balance in the Joint Account to the surviving Customer”. ²⁹²

252 As explained at [249] above, the existence of a joint tenancy at law over the CIMB and DBS Joint Bank Accounts gives rise to a starting presumption that the account holders were also joint tenants in equity. As further explained at [250] above, that starting presumption can be displaced, eg, if there is evidence that the Testatrix did not intend for her share of the account balance to devolve to the surviving account holder(s), such that a resulting trust can be inferred, or if the circumstances (including the account holders’ respective contributions to the balance) allow a resulting trust to be presumed.

253 The Claimant contends that the onus is on the Defendant to plead and prove the factors showing that the right of survivorship applied to the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts. ²⁹³ With respect, this submission is misplaced.

(a) In so far as the pleadings are concerned, they unequivocally reflect the fact that the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts are joint bank accounts, where the account holders include both the Testatrix and the Defendant. ²⁹⁴ There is no need for the Defendant to go beyond this and plead the legal consequence flowing from that fact, including the starting presumption in Collars v Collars (see [249] above) that the beneficial interest in the entire balance devolves to the surviving account holder under the right of survivorship.

(b) As regards the burden of proof, it is for the Claimant to rebut the starting position that the right of survivorship operated not just at law but in equity well. As explained in Collars v Collars (at [30]):

254 Unfortunately for the Claimant, the evidence fails to persuade me that a departure from the starting position (that there was a right of survivorship in equity) is warranted. For instance, the evidence is not in any way suggestive of an intention by the Testatrix for the Estate to retain the benefit of any part of the balances in the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts, such that a resulting trust may be inferred. The Claimant attempts to rely on cl 4 of the Will, by which the Testatrix purported to bequeath “all my monies”, including those “in joint bank accounts”. ²⁹⁵ The Claimant argues that by this clause, the Testatrix clearly demonstrated an intention for the Estate to retain the benefit of her share in any joint account balances belonging to her, with a view to that share then being distributed in accordance with the Will. ²⁹⁶ I reject this argument for the following reasons:

(a) Firstly, there is nothing to indicate that this clause was directed at the CIMB and DBS Bank Accounts.

(b) Secondly, this directive was predicated on the balances in the joint account being “my monies”. There is no evidence that the Testatrix had deposited any of her own monies into the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts prior to her death.

255 Similarly, the complete dearth of evidence as to the Testatrix’s contributions (if any) to the balance in both bank accounts makes it difficult for a resulting trust to be presumed. Indeed, the Defendant claims that all the monies in both bank accounts came from him and not the Testatrix (see [246] above). The Claimant has not adduced any evidence to refute this, save to complain that the reasons proffered by the Defendant for opening up a joint account with the Testatrix are unconvincing. ²⁹⁷

256 As regards the CIMB Joint Account in particular, the Claimant also contends that on 2 September 2013, the Testatrix’s monies in fixed deposits were misappropriated, with $225,704.94 of these monies being re-directed into the CIMB Joint Account. ²⁹⁸ However, given that these fund flows occurred some nine months after the Testatrix’s death, they offer no insight into what the Testatrix’s intentions were, or what monies of hers went into the CIMB Joint Account, while she was still alive. To be clear, the Claimant is not pursuing a proprietary remedy targeted at the misappropriated funds (eg, tracing). Rather, he is seeking an account of the balance in the CIMB Joint Account, which is a remedy focused not on specific monetary deposits of questionable origin but on the CIMB Joint Account as a whole. If granted, the Defendant would conceivably be liable to explain entries in the CIMB Joint Account’s statements that have nothing to do with the purportedly misappropriated funds. An account is thus not the appropriate remedy for that and I see no basis for ordering it.

257 Consequently, I dismiss the Claimant’s claim for an account of the balances in the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts. These starting position – being that the balances were held by the account holders as joint tenancies not only at law but in equity as well – stands unrebutted. Upon the Testatrix’s death, her beneficial interest (if there was any to begin with) in the balances within the CIMB and DBS Joint Accounts was extinguished. These balances thus did not form part of the Estate and the Defendant is consequently not liable (in his capacity as executor) to account for them.

258 The Defendant, on his part, also seeks an account from the Claimant of various bank accounts.

259 At the outset, I should state that I found it extremely difficult to decipher, from the Defendant’s pleadings, just what bank accounts he is seeking an account of. I set out the relevant portions of his Defence and Counterclaim:

260 As seen from paras 115(a), 116(a) and 118(a) of the extract of the Defence and Counterclaim above, one of the banks alluded to is “Standard Chartered Bank”. However, the Defendant’s pleadings failed to provide any bank account numbers(s), making it extremely difficult for me to tell if the Defendant was intending to refer to a single bank account or to different bank accounts with Standard Chartered Bank. Indeed, this lack of clarity prompted the Claimant to request for further and better particulars as to what “Standard Chartered Bank” – as reflected in a previous iteration of para 118(a) of the Defence and Counterclaim – meant. The Defendant had responded to this request with the following particulars: “The term “Standard Chartered Bank” refers to the Joint Bank Account, Bank Account Number XXXXXX3344”, ²⁹⁹ ie, the SCB Joint Account. Accordingly, in the absence of particulars of any other bank accounts, I have proceeded on the basis that the “Standard Chartered Bank” account for which the Defendant seeks an account to be furnished – as set out in paras 116(a) and 118(b) – is the SCB Joint Account.

261 I also note that in a previous iteration of para 118(a) of the Defence and Counterclaim, the Defendant pleaded his claim for the following remedy:299

However, in the latest version of the Defence and Counterclaim extracted above, the references to “POSB Joint Account” and “CIMB” have been struck out from para 118(a). I draw two conclusions from this:

(a) As regards the POSB Joint Account, the Defendant no longer requires the Claimant to furnish an account. The Claimant has also made that assumption in his closing submissions ³⁰⁰ and the Defendant’s submissions in reply do not contradict this.

(b) As for the reference to “CIMB”, although this has been struck out from para 118(a), para 116(a) still continues to refer to “CIMB Joint” – which I assume to mean the CIMB Joint Account. Given that para 118(b) requires an account of the items in para 116, I will assume that the Defendant is still pursuing an account of the CIMB Joint Account.

262 Finally, it is unclear to me what the Defendant was referring to by the term “joint bank ac-counts” [sic] in para 116(i) of the Defence and Counterclaim, extracted above. There is nothing in the Defence and Counterclaim attributing any account numbers to these “joint bank ac-counts” [sic]. Indeed, it is not even clear what banks the “joint bank ac-counts” [sic] were held with. The Defendant’s closing submissions similarly argue that the Claimant should be made to furnish an account of the “joint accounts” ³⁰¹ without clarifying what these “joint accounts” were.

263 I have also considered if the term “joint bank ac-counts” [sic] in para 116(i) was meant to refer to the accounts in para 115(i) of the Defence and Counterclaim, which alludes to “all bank accounts held jointly in the names of the Testatrix and/or George, Jack, Dione, Joanne, the Claimant, and the Claimant’s children”. However, even if I had been minded to draw such a link, this would still not remedy the deficiencies in the Defendant’s pleadings. The Defendant was clear in his oral testimony that he has no idea whether the Testatrix actually shared a joint bank account with any of these persons. ³⁰² He made no effort to check with them if she did. ³⁰³ Critically, the Defendant admitted while on the stand that he was “not sure” whether the monies in these joint accounts (assuming they even existed) contained monies belonging to the Estate. ³⁰⁴

264 Given the dearth of particulars, I am unable to arrive at any ruling on the Defendant’s claim for an account to be furnished, as regards the “joint bank ac-counts” [sic] in para 116(i) of the Defence and Counterclaim. The Defendant could have avoided this ambiguity by writing to the banks (in his capacity as executor) to get the bank account numbers of interest and listing them clearly in his pleadings. It is inexplicable why he failed to do so, leaving the court to piece together just what joint bank accounts he was referring to.

265  The upshot of the observations above is that I am able to address the Defendant’s claim for an account only in respect of (a) the SCB Joint Account and (b) the CIMB Joint Account. In doing so, my findings can be stated quite summarily:

(a) As regards the SCB Joint Account, the Defendant himself has pleaded that this was opened only “upon the passing of the Testatrix”. ³⁰⁵ The Testatrix was never an account holder of this bank account and there is no evidence of it ever having held any of the Testatrix’s monies.

(b) As for the CIMB Account, it is the Defendant’s own case that the Testatrix never made any deposits into this bank account, which primarily contained his own monies (see [246] above).

266 In light of the above, I conclude that neither bank account has been shown to contain monies from the Estate, for which the Claimant (as executor) is liable to give an account. Accordingly, the Defendant’s claim for an account in respect of these two bank accounts is dismissed.

267 The Defendant contends that the Claimant had wrongfully withdrawn monies from the POSB Joint Account, ³⁰⁶ which was held in the joint names of the Testatrix and Peter (who predeceased the Testatrix). ³⁰⁷ According to the Defendant, the Claimant withdrew a total sum of $17,800 over four occasions, spanning 19 to 22 December 2012 (both dates inclusive). ³⁰⁸ The Defendant asserts that half of the sums withdrawn belonged to him and thus claims against the Claimant for $8,900. ³⁰⁹

268 If the withdrawals above were wrongful, a cause of action in respect of the sums withdrawn may well have accrued to the Testatrix (and, upon her death, to the Estate). However, that is not the basis of the Defendant’s claim in respect of the withdrawals. His claim is premised on the withdrawals having been made in breach of the Claimant’s fiduciary duties as executor (see [13] above). The Defendant thus cannot succeed in his claim unless the withdrawals occurred after the Testatrix’s death, since the fiduciary duties of an executor would not have come to rest on the Claimant prior to the point of her passing.

269 This brings me to the threshold question of exactly when the $17,800 had been withdrawn. According to the Defendant, the withdrawals were made by the Claimant on the following four days: ³¹⁰

270 Given that the Testatrix died on 21 December 2012, the following conclusions follow:

(a) The withdrawals on 19 and 20 December 2012 were made when the Testatrix was still alive. That being the case, these two withdrawals would have been made before the Claimant’s fiduciary duties as an executor came into force. Accordingly, the Defendant’s claim that these withdrawals were in breach of the Claimant’s fiduciary duties as an executor fails.

(b) As for the withdrawal on 21 December 2012 – being the very day on which the Testatrix passed away – the issue of whether the withdrawal was made after or before she died would naturally come down to a much closer shave. As the Defendant bears the burden of proving his claim, the onus lies on him to establish that the withdrawal was made after the Testatrix’s death. However, no evidence was proffered at trial casting light on the issue of exactly when the withdrawal was made. Probability-wise, it is also not possible to give the Defendant the benefit of the doubt on this issue, simply by virtue of the fact that the Testatrix died at 11.29pm – literally the eleventh hour on 21 December 2012. ³¹¹ With her passing being that late in the night, the withdrawal on 21 December 2012 was far more likely than not made before her death, and thus prior to the Claimant’s fiduciary duties as an executor coming into force. The Defendant’s claim that this withdrawal was made by the Claimant in breach of his fiduciary duty as an executor should thus be rejected as well.

Accordingly, the Defendant’s claim is viable only in respect of the final withdrawal of $2,800, on 22 December 2012. It is to that withdrawal which I now turn.

271 The Claimant explains that he had made the withdrawals from the POSB Joint Account to reimburse himself after he spent about $22,238.24 of his Medisave funds on the Testatrix’s medical bills. ³¹² The difficulty with this explanation is that an adult child who pays for his aged parent’s medical expenses is generally presumed to have intended to make these payments gratuitously, without expecting the payment to give rise to an enforceable debt as against the parent: Ong Wui Teck at [55]. The Claimant raises the contention – both in his pleadings and AEIC312 – that the Testatrix told him on many occasions to use the balance in the POSB Joint Account to reimburse himself for his expenditure on her medical bills. Presumably, his case is that the Testatrix agreed that his expenditure would give rise to a debt which he could claim from her (and thus from the Estate). However, this assertion is somewhat at odds with his oral evidence at trial, where he said that it was the Defendant (rather than the Testatrix) who suggested that the Claimant reimburse himself from the POSB Joint Account. ³¹³ Given this lack of consistency, I am not prepared to accept the Claimant’s assertions that he was authorised (whether by the Testatrix or the Defendant) to reimburse himself from the POSB Joint Account. In arriving at this determination, I stand guided by the observation in Ong Wui Teck (at [44]) that “claims for repayment of debts made against deceased persons should be supported by compelling evidence, given that the deceased persons would be unable to rebut such claims posthumously”.

272 To summarise my findings on the Claimant’s withdrawals from the POSB Joint Account:

(a) I dismiss the Defendant’s claim in respect of the withdrawals on 19, 20 and 21 December 2012.

(b) I allow the Defendant’s claim that the Claimant withdrew $2,800 from the POSB Joint Account on 22 December 2012, in breach of his fiduciary duties.

I thus order the Claimant to return the sum of $2,800 to the Estate.

273 The following sets out a summary of my decision in this case.

274 In respect of the EK Property, I make the following orders.

(a) For the months of September to November 2016, when the Defendant’s family resided at the EK Property, the Defendant is to pay the Claimant the monthly rent of $4,000 – totalling $12,000 for three months.

(b) As regards the rent paid by Jason under the 2nd and 3rd Tenancy Agreements, the Defendant is to pay the Claimant the latter’s half share of the following:

(i) Rent under the 2nd Tenancy Agreement for the months of August and September 2019, which Jason funded using the security deposit – the Claimant’s half share of this being $7,800.

(ii) Rent under the 3rd Tenancy Agreement for the months September 2021 to January 2022 – the Claimant’s half share of this being $19,500.

(iii) As regards the rent collected from Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement, comprising the $142,971.04 in the SCB Joint Account, the Parties are to take collective steps to withdraw this sum from the SCB Joint Account, so that they can each cash out their respective half shares of the same. Any interest earned on the principal sums deposited into the SCB Joint Account is to also be divided equally between the Parties.

(c) The following claims by the Defendant, raised in relation to the rent collected from Jason, are dismissed:

(i) That the Claimant pays the “excess rent” of $74,880 collected from Jason under the 1st Tenancy Agreement.

(ii) That the Claimant accounts for the rent collected from Jason.

(d) The remaining claims by the Defendant in relation to the EK Property, set out below, are also dismissed:

(i) That the Claimant reimburses the Defendant for the property tax of $13,420.50 which the Defendant claims to have paid.

(ii) That the Claimant pays the Defendant $15,600, which the Defendant claims to be the commission due to him as the property agent who procured Jason’s tenancies.

275 The Defendant’s claim in defamation is dismissed. While the PropNex Email may have carried a defamatory meaning, the defences of justification and qualified privilege are both made out.

276 As regards the Handwritten Note, I find that its formation was supported by consideration and that it was not vitiated by duress. The Claimant is thus entitled to compel the Defendant to honour the terms of the Handwritten Note.

277 In respect of the Far East Property,

(a) I grant the Claimant’s claim that the Defendant furnishes an account of the rental proceeds which the Defendant had collected and (upon taking of the account) pay the Claimant his one-third share of the same, after permissible deductions.

(b) I reject the Defendant’s claim that the Claimant furnishes an account of the maintenance fees and property tax.

278 In relation to the Defendant’s claims that the Claimant furnishes an account in respect of the EK Shortfall, the Gold Investment and the blue attaché case:

(a) I dismiss the claim for an account of the EK Shortfall, as it is time-barred.

(b) I also dismiss the claim for an account of the Gold Investment as there is insufficient evidence that this formed part of the Estate’s assets.

(c) I grant the claim for an account of the blue attaché case and its contents.

279 I dismiss both Parties’ claims for an account of the joint bank accounts highlighted in their respective pleadings.

280 Finally, I order the Claimant to return to the Estate the $2,800 which he withdrew from the POSB Joint Account.

281 I will now hear the Parties on the issue of costs of the trial.