G.R. No. 160107 - SPOUSES JAIME SEBASTIAN AND EVANGELINE SEBASTIAN, VS. BPI FAMILY BANK, INC., CARMELITA ITAPO AND BENJAMIN HAO.D E C I S I O N - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

Accordingly, the petitioners could not raise the applicability of Republic Act No. 6552, or the strict construction of the loan agreement for being a contract of adhesion as issues for the first time either in their motion for reconsideration or in their petition filed in this Court. To allow them to do so would violate the adverse parties right to fairness and due process. As the Court held in S.C. Megaworld Construction and Development Corporation v. Parada : [26] It is well-settled that no question will be entertained on appeal unless it has been raised in the proceedings below. Points of law, theories, issues and arguments not brought to the attention of the lower court, administrative agency or quasi-judicial body , need not be considered by the viewing court, as they cannot be raised for the first time at that late stage. Basic considerations of fairness and due process impel this rule. Any issue raised for the first time on appeal is barred by estoppel. The procedural misstep of the petitioners notwithstanding, the Court finds no substantial basis to reverse the judgments of the lower courts. Republic Act No. 6552 was enacted to protect buyers of real estate on installment payments against onerous and oppressive conditions. [27] The protections accorded to the buyers were embodied in Sections 3, 4 and 5 of the law, to wit: Section 3. In all transactions or contracts, involving the sale or financing of real estate on installment payments, including residential condominium apartments but excluding industrial lots, commercial buildings and sales to tenants under Republic Act Numbered Thirty-Eight hundred forty-four as amended by Republic Act Sixty-three hundred eighty-nine, where the buyer has paid at least two years of installments, the buyer is entitled to the following rights in case he defaults in the payment of succeeding installments: (a) To pay, without additional interest, the unpaid installments due within the total grace period earned by him which is hereby fixed at that rate of one month grace period for every one year of installment payments made; provided, That this right shall be exercised by the Buyer only once in every five years of the life of the contract and its extensions, if any. (b) If the contract is cancelled, the seller shall refund to the buyer the cash surrender value of the payments on the property equivalent to fifty percent of the total payments made, and, after five years of installments, an additional five per cent every year but not to exceed ninety per cent of the total payments made; Provided, That the actual cancellation or the demand for rescission of the contract by a notarial act and upon full payment of the cash surrender value to the buyer. Down payments, deposits or options on the contract shall be included in the computation of the total number of installment payments made. SECTION 4. In case where less than two years of installments were paid, the seller shall give the buyers a grace period of not