Skipping town

[birdymama2003]

What is the name of your state? Maryland
I sold a bird to a woman and allowed her to make payments. I found out today that she is leaving town this Tuesday. How do I get my money now? She signed a contract with me and has until April !st to pay, but if she leaves town I will never find her. She will not return my calls or answer her door.

 

[HomeGuru]

What is the name of your state? Maryland
I sold a bird to a woman and allowed her to make payments. I found out today that she is leaving town this Tuesday. How do I get my money now? She signed a contract with me and has until April !st to pay, but if she leaves town I will never find her. She will not return my calls or answer her door.

**A: it appears that she is trying to flip you the bird.

 

[JETX]

"How do I get my money now?"
*** I guess you are going to have to see if you can put a cat through her window. WIth any luck, at least she won't be able to keep her bird.
Seriously, what sort of answer do you expect this forum to offer?? We are a legal forum.... and if she breaches the agreement, you can file what is likely a small claims action against her. However, at this point, you haven't even said if she is in breach of the agreement.

 

[I AM ALWAYS LIABLE]

"How do I get my money now?"
*** I guess you are going to have to see if you can put a cat through her window. WIth any luck, at least she won't be able to keep her bird.
Seriously, what sort of answer do you expect this forum to offer?? We are a legal forum.... and if she breaches the agreement, you can file what is likely a small claims action against her. However, at this point, you haven't even said if she is in breach of the agreement.

My response:

Actually, if she's quick enough, she can sue the woman for "anticipatory breach of contract." The facts would be that the woman has a duty to our writer to inform her of her whereabouts and that of the bird. If either party repudiates the contract before performance is due, the other can treat it as an anticipatory breach and sue immediately. But the statute of limitations does not run until actual termination, so as not to penalize plaintiff for giving defendant time to retract the repudiation:

"Indeed, whether the breach is anticipatory or not, when there are ongoing contractual obligations the plaintiff may elect to rely on the contract despite a breach, and the statute of limitations does not begin to run until the plaintiff has elected to treat the breach as terminating the contract." [Romano v. Rockwell Int'l, Inc., supra, 14 Cal.4th at 489, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d at 25]

IAAL

 

[AmosMoses]

Maybe you should...

...have sold her a homing pigeon.

 

[JETX]

IAAL, I agree with the 'anticipatory breach', but at this point, even that isn't clear.

The writer is only saying that the buyer is leaving town. And unless there is a contractual requirement that the buyer not leave town, where is the 'anticipation' of breach??

And to AmosMoses... your post is great!! Got my morning off with a good chuckle. Thanks.

 

[birdymama2003]

Bird

The thing with the bird is this...She isn't a cheap bird, she can make several mortgage payments for us. Also, I was promised weekly updates on the bird which was my way of keeping track of her. She did this for about a month and since then I hadn't heard from her which is why I checked and found she is moving this week. My question now is how can I legally find out where she is moving? Her old neighbors don't know and I don't know how else to track her down. Any suggestions? I know the reason she is moving is because her husband got a job as a Pastor of his own church. Isn't that funny?