What are the elements of consent?

1. Legal capacity of the contracting parties;

2. Manifestation of the conformity of the contracting parties;

3. Parties’ Conformity to the object, cause, terms and condition of the contract must be intelligent, spontaneous and free from all vices of consent; and

4. The conformity must be Real.

Note: We follow the theory of cognition and not the theory of manifestation. Under our Civil Law, the offer & acceptance concur only when the offeror comes to know, and not when the offeree merely manifests his acceptance.

What are the vices of consent?

1. Mistake – substantial mistake and not merely an accidental mistake; must refer to the:

     a. substance of the thing which is the subject of the contract; or

     b. to those conditions which have principally moved one or both parties to enter the contract.

Note: Mistake as to identity or qualifications of one of the parties will vitiate consent only when such identity or qualifications have been the principal cause of the contract.

2. Intimidation – An internal moral force operating in the will and inducing performance of an act.

3. Violence – An external, serious or irresistible physical force exerted upon a person to prevent him from doing something or to compel him to do an act.

4. Undue influence – Any means employed upon a party which, under the circumstances could not be resisted and has the effect of controlling his volition and inducing him to give his consent to the contract, which otherwise, he would not have entered into.

5. Fraud – Use of insidious words or machinations in inducing another party to enter into the contract, which without them, he would not have agreed.