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problem with a car sale i made.please advice!!

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M

murs

Guest
New YorkHi,
Thank you so much in advance for reading this.Your advice will be greatly appreciated.

I put an ad in a local magazine for the sale of my car.A prospective buyer responded to the ad on the 4th of March,and came over to my place and inspected the car himself and said was concerned about an oil leak it had.We suggested he show it to a mechanic if he wished.But he bargained and offered a price $3050.We agreed to sell.We gave a list of the service and repair records we'd kept.
He took the car for a test drive .After the drive, he said he felt it would need a repair ,so brought down the price to $2850, and we agreed.He asked us to get the car cleaned for him.He paid a deposit and left.
He returned the next day, saw the car again and paid the balance and took the title and drove the car again.He asked if the car had no problems, and we told him we were not too knowledgeable about cars but it sure didn't give us a problem during the past one year that we owned it.
He now comes back on the 15th of March and says the car is bad and we didn't share our knowledge of the car with him,and demands a refund.(We told him whatever we knew of the car and it was sold in good faith).He threatens legal action and had an attorney call us yesterday.
I'm leaving the country next week.What is my legal position now?What do you suggest I should do? Please advice!!
 


n_and

Member
Okay. First off, when you wrote out a bill of sale, did you sell the car 'as is'?

edit: I forgot to tell you, take a deep breath and calm down. You sound stressed out, and if everything you are saying is truth, it is entirely possible you will be okay. Lemon laws only apply to new cars, not used ones. You disclosed any info you knew about the condition of the car. Have you verified that this is an actual attorney, and not some stunt the buyer is pulling to get his money back? (trust me, I've seen it happen.
 
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M

murs

Guest
yeah just checked the phone no. he'd given .seems to be the number of some attorney.
 

n_and

Member
Okay. Sorry I never got back to you last night, satellite internet & it was snowing...anyway.

Chances are you will be alright. He may take you to court, you can sue whomever you want, and you can take anyone to court that you want. A judge MAY rule against you. If that car was sold as is, and it states that on the bill of sale, there is nothing the buyer can do. Frankly, if the car was sold to him for 2850$ and now he is paying for a lawyer, I think this is ridiculous. A decent lawyer costs half of that.

So did you sell the car 'as is'? Also, how long are you leaving the country for?
 
M

murs

Guest
hi
Thanks a lot for writing
it was not mentioned 'as is' on the paper.The buyer just wrote out his name and mine, on a small paper, along with the price and my address.But my friends here tell me, that all private sales are 'as is'. I'm about to complete my assignment in this country and as of now, no immediate plans of coming back.
 

JETX

Senior Member
From your post, it appears that you did nothing wrong. Tell the guy to 'tell it to the court'.
There is a basic principal called 'caveat emptor', meaning 'let the buyer beware'. Simply, the basic premise is that the buyer buys at his/her own risk and therefore should examine and test a product himself/herself for obvious defects and imperfections. Caveat emptor still applies even if the purchase is "as is" or when a defect is obvious upon reasonable inspection before purchase.

As long as you didn't make any statements of 'guarantees or quality' then you should be okay. The buyer had opportunity to have his mechanic inspect the vehicle. He chose not to, and assumes the liability for his choice.
 

n_and

Member
I would hate to advise you of anything unethical, but seeing as I am not a lawyer yet...Don't even worry about it. Basically what COULD happen is you go to court, state your side of what happened, and the judge makes a ruling; most likely in your favor. (If it even gets that far, which I don't see as happening, considering the costs of court v. the cost of the car)) If you are leaving the country with no plans of coming back any time soon, just go. You are obviously just working in this country, so it's not like you are fleeing to get out of this car mess. Your emploers can verify that. Don't even sweat it.
 

n_and

Member
Hey you know what else? Go to assembly.state.ny.us and click consolidated laws. It's either Chapter 3 or 3-A, I believe 3, that covers fraudulant sales of personal property. Read it because you will see the chances of you having to pay him back are unlikely.
 

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