Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Pennsylvania
my grams boyfriend gave me $3000.00 to help me buy my trailor. we never had a agreement that i would pay him back. when he wrote the check out he made it to the office where i live and him and my gram dropped the check off i never saw the check.. now my gram is mad at me and says they want the money back she send me a copy of the cancelled check and in the memo it says loan to megan. am i responsible to pay the money back? this is almost 3 years old and i live in pa..
1 Answer from Attorneys
Its the boyfriend's word against yours. The problem is the memo line of the check says "loan." What a small claim's judge will make of that I cannot say.
The statute of limitations in PA is 4 years for most things like contracts or loans assuming that your grandmother and her boyfriend also are in PA. Have you ever received a written demand for repayment?
You leave out many details from your post. Why would a boyfriend of your grandmother choose to make a $3,000 gift to you? If it was a loan, did he ever indicate when you should start repaying it? Why is this only an issue now? What happened that your grndmother is now mad at you? Do you have the money to pay them back?
I don't need an answer but these are all questions that you need to think about these. If your grandmother is truly mad at you, nothing will stop her and her boyfriend from going to the magistrate and suing you in small claims so you had best be prepared how you will argue that it was a gift rather than a loan.
If you receive a written demand then you also need to respond to it reiterating that this was a gift rather than a loan if that is what it was.
Of course, if you can afford to repay it, you may want to think about that even if it was a gift. You can repay the boyfriend and then tell the grandmother and boyfriend that you are not beholden to them any more and want nothing further to do with them. However, that is up to you and will depend on your relationship with your grandmother and her boyfriend.