breach of sale agreement... take action or not?

[madgripyo]

explaining all this may take some time, but bare with me... i could use some non-bias opinions. i bought my sti this past august, and i feel it was a good price. if you want to know how much i paid, PM me, i'd rather not post it here. i'll spare details that i don't think are crucial.

included in the sale of the (complete) car was the following; stock steering wheel with airbag, quick release steering wheel hub for the nardi wheel that was on the car, and a cobb accessport. this was stated in a PM between myself and the seller. also stated was that the car was in great condition, and had no notable defects.

i flew my ass half way across the country, with a certified bank check. when i got there, things got a bit interesting. the car was FILTHY on the outside, but the interior nearly immaculate. the seller told me i picked a good day to come down, because it had just stopped storming, so i figured it was no big deal it was dirty.

upon closer inspection, the car looked like it had been keyed, wheels rashed to hell, the tires were bald, and the oil pressure gauge wasn't hooked up. this was annoying to discover, but nothing that i didn't secretly suspect. in the car was the hub, and the stock wheel with airbag. he explained that he forgot to put the AP in the car, and he would send it to me. i asked if we could go to his house and get it. he told me that he had just moved, and it was in an unknown box somewhere in his house, and really didn't want to tear everything apart. i have a witness to our agreement of him sending me the AP and the second key, my girlfriend came with me on the journey.

we still went through with the sale. despite the found flaws, the car ran perfectly, it has a tasteful and valuable mod list, and i REALLY got a great price. the car was in his mom's name, so technically i bought it from his parents. they were really great people, and i trusted the situation.

flash forward three months (almost to the day). car is still running great, cleaned it up, tied up some loose ends, and i am very pleased with my purchase. however, i don't have the damn accessport yet! the kid i got it from won't return calls or texts. my next move is calling his parents and telling them what their jerk offspring did.

my questions are... am i making too much of a big deal about the accessport? should i just let it go? should i push harder? i don't want to be a jerk, but i also don't want to be a push over either.

[boostjunky]

Get what you paid for. Call the bunghole.

[Bender]

go to the folks, no doubt about it.

[madgripyo]

thanks for reading that book guys, haha,

Originally Posted by boostjunky

Get what you paid for. Call the bunghole.

haha, the bunghole gets a call from me at least once a week.

Originally Posted by Bender

go to the folks, no doubt about it.

i agree that this is the next logical step, thanks for the input.

[Bender]

If I had tried to rip someone off as a kid my old man would have put the hurt on me! Good luck on getting your accessport.

[madgripyo]

^ thanks buddy. i'll definitely update here.

[jen.]

I would have suspected something suspicious when the accessport was "misplaced", but if you paid for it there is really no reason not to follow through. It sounds like you've given adequate time for a reply from the original owner. It may not be a bad idea to contact the parents as your next step, considering you technically bought the car from his mom. Additionally, by doing so you're covering all grounds.

[BlueMSProtege]

a few questions:
1. do you have it in writing that included in the sale was the access port?
2. do you have the agreement in writing with the amended portion concerning the delivery of the accessport following the sale?
3. Was the witness impartial (did they know you or him, how well do they know either of you)
4. How do you know his parents?
5. Have you documented all of the times you have tried to contact him (date, time)
6. do you know his current address or could you get it?
7. How much of the total cost was for the access port?

I am a first year law student but worked for an attorney for awhile while in undergrad and could give you some basic idea as to your options at this point. My first suggestion before you even respond to my questions is that you contact an attorney. For something like this the fee would be very low, more than likely the attorney would send a letter to the guy advising him of the agreement and the requirement on his part to uphold his end of the agreement. If that does not work you can choose to file suit to either obtain the part or the monetary value of the part. You can bring suit in your state and he will have to fly there for court (unless he tries to change venue but it is hard to argue that since most states long arm statutes allow for you to have him be forced to come to your state but the attorney will advise you of all of this.) If you have a signed written agreement that was witnessed and had an amended portion saying he will send it to you then you have a good chance of getting a result.

[madgripyo]

Originally Posted by BlueMSProtege

a few questions:
1. do you have it in writing that included in the sale was the access port?
2. do you have the agreement in writing with the amended portion concerning the delivery of the accessport following the sale?
3. Was the witness impartial (did they know you or him, how well do they know either of you)
4. How do you know his parents?
5. Have you documented all of the times you have tried to contact him (date, time)
6. do you know his current address or could you get it?
7. How much of the total cost was for the access port?

I am a first year law student but worked for an attorney for awhile while in undergrad and could give you some basic idea as to your options at this point. My first suggestion before you even respond to my questions is that you contact an attorney. For something like this the fee would be very low, more than likely the attorney would send a letter to the guy advising him of the agreement and the requirement on his part to uphold his end of the agreement. If that does not work you can choose to file suit to either obtain the part or the monetary value of the part. You can bring suit in your state and he will have to fly there for court (unless he tries to change venue but it is hard to argue that since most states long arm statutes allow for you to have him be forced to come to your state but the attorney will advise you of all of this.) If you have a signed written agreement that was witnessed and had an amended portion saying he will send it to you then you have a good chance of getting a result.

firstly my friend... you will make a great lawyer one day, i could only understand half of what you just wrote. however, you need more triple negatives. haha, only kidding friend. thanks for all the advice, you certainly know your stuff.

1. yes.
2. yes.
3. i have two witnesses, my girlfriend of a few months (at the time). she met him when i did, and knows him as well as i do. the second witness is his father, who only met me that once.
4. i know his parents only because of the sale.
5. no, not all. i do however have more than half documented, including texts promising to get the AP to me within a reasonable amount of time.
6. yes.
7. unclear. they're $695 new, and i can only speculate that i would have offered $500 less than my final offer.

i would really like to avoid taking the legal route at all costs. his parents were really great to me, i'd hate to 'long arm' them half way across the country because of their bonehead son. since his mom was technically the seller, i guess it would be her i went after. if i do however, decide to take legal action, i'll be PMing you so you can point me in the right direction as for good attorneys for this sort of thing. really though, thanks for the reply.

to be totally honest, i have a feeling that the kid lost the accessport and just wont call me back.

[BlueMSProtege]

^I think you are taking the right path. Contact the parents especially if it was the mother selling the car. The fact that one witness knows you and the other witness knows him is good, if you only had one witness and they knew you very well it makes them less credible. I would call the parents and make them aware of the situation, think of a good amount of time that is acceptable to you to receive the accessport. State how long their son has to send you the part (but in a nice way) so that he cant prolong this any further. Let them know that you would rather resolve this amongst yourselves but you are not ruling out the option of pursuing this matter through the court system If it is not resolved in a reasonable amount of time. This puts them on notice that if they dont handle this they subject themselves to the possibility of legal fees. Make sure you dont get rid of the text messages or emails. Any further phone calls to him or his parents note the day and the time. If you leave a message indicate you did so and the content of the message. If you talk to them write a breif description of the conversation and write down any important facts such as amount of time they agree to or if they say they will call you back write down when to expect the call. All of this is very important to show their lack of a good faith effort to abide by the contract.

Are you in DE, NJ, or PA. I live in MD but go to school in DE so I dont know that many lawyers here but I will see how much of a help I could be.

[97TurboDSM]

fyi, verbal agreement to sell something with confirmation from the buyer is as good as writing. good luck getting your stuff.

[BlueMSProtege]

^it is but it is harder to prove

[ASIAN JUL]

Good luck, I definitely think you should be getting what you paid for!

The problem with verbal agreements is they usually require an unbiased third party to the agreement.

[mcperson2k]

Id call the rents. I don't know if I would take it to court, cause I think you would have to attend court where the transaction took place, which is half way across the country.

[jpalamar]

You shoudl get what you paid for, but once money was transfered and the title is out of the owners name, thats all they are obligated to do. Unless you had it in writing that they would give you something in addition, you have nothing. You say you have PM from him saying he will include it in the sale, but do you have proof that he didn't already give it to you?

My advise, if you have proof he said he would include something and didn't, then get what is yours. It is business, plane and simple.

I will say this though, you are a moron for buying a car and not getting everything the day of the sale, especially from a private party.

[BlueMSProtege]

Originally Posted by mcperson2k

Id call the rents. I don't know if I would take it to court, cause I think you would have to attend court where the transaction took place, which is half way across the country.

because they are from different states he could have trial in his state but you are right the other guy can motion for a change of venue to have it at his state.

[TROLL]

Just call the parents... no real reason to hesitate on that IMO.
The longer you wait the more of a battle it'll be on your end.
At the same time keep in mind that Accessports are cheap now... so you should get what you paid for but don't kill yourself over it. You can always just go get an Open Source tune and forget about it.

[sinner]

Dude, you definitely needx to get AP. It's got the cars stock tune downloaded onto it. I'd contact his parents and explain what the AP is and how important it is that you have it. His parents probably have no clue. If they're decent people (which you said they were), they will light a fire under his a$$ to find it.

[madgripyo]

excellent responses folks, lots of good points were made. thanks. i WILL be calling the parents. perhaps sometime this weekend, don't totally want to deal with this during the holiday. i'm glad the general consensus followed what i had in mind, and that i'm not being crazy for going after the AP. i'll definitely bump this thread when i have some new info.

[madgripyo]

update: i got the goods ;)