Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Virginia
Breach of Verbal Agreement for Automobile
Two months ago, I made a verbal agreement with a gentleman that was a family member of a friend. He agreed to buy a car from me, with weekly payments. I turned over the title to him, and did not place on lien on it. The only problem was the cars title was not in my name. I bought the car intending to use it, but never did. The title was signed by the previous owner, which is a friend. But the gentleman that has possesion of the car now, has continuly missed payments and is now four weeks behind. This past week, he didn't call with an usual excuse, or make arangements to make the payment. Do I have a case to go to court with? Considering the gentleman I bought it from is willing to go to court and so are the people that witnessed the verbal agreement?
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: Breach of Verbal Agreement for Automobile
My sense is that this "gentleman" will prove very difficult to get any money out of, even if you were to secure a judgment against him in court.
You might want to consider calling him up and telling him that since he's now in default, the deal is now off and he must return the vehicle along with the title to you and you will refund whatever money he's paid; otherwise you'll have no alternative but to take him to court, if you don't hire a repo man first.
Re: Breach of Verbal Agreement for Automobile
Ordinarily a contract for the sale of goods is not enforceable unless there's a signed written agreement or the value of the goods is less than five hundred dollars. There's an exception in the statute for contracts that are otherwise enforceable, and some courts take that to mean that an oral agreement can be enforced even where the amount of the contract is greater than five hundred dollars if there are other reliable indications that there really was a contract. If the guy transferred the title, that's a pretty good indication - he had to have signed the application for title. He may have fudged the price, though, to get a lower sales and use tax assessment.
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