Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California
A month or two ago, I was helping my boyfriend's father move some items with my dad's truck. As I was backing the truck up the driveway, I accidentally dented their garage door. My boyfriend's father purposely never told me I hit the door and there was no damage to the truck so i had no idea I had dented the door. He did not seem to care at the time, not even enough to let me know what happened. Now, he is demanding $1,000 to repair the door and will not let me choose who I want to repair it even though I know someone who can do it much more affordable. I am a 17 year college student with a part time job and no reasonable means to acquire $1,000 in such a short amount of time. Does he have a right to make me fix the door with whichever company he chooses although he never took action whatsoever or even told me anything until now?
1 Answer from Attorneys
This is a difficult question to answer, because it involves mixed and conflicting issues of strict legali theory vs. moral concepts, issues of friends and family, and possibly a difficult distinction between "negligence" and a "pure accident."
How you handle this has got to be a personal decision based upon your intuition and feelings about your relationships with this family and your view of to what extent you were at fault as opposed to merely unlucky.
I think if you were taken to small claims court it is probably slightly more likely that you would lose, but the plaintiff has to explain and prove quite a bit, including why no one was assisting you by keeping watch, why they waited a month, why they insist on their estimate and their repairman, and why you were negligent (as opposed to unlucky).
I suggest you offer a compromise, maybe $600 paid at $30 a month, no interest; if he doesn't take it, see him in court. More importantly, you might want to re-appraise your overall relationship with the boyfriend and his family.
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