Dyflin
Well-Known Member
An unusual story in that the original surveyor got away scott free
Fort Lauderdale-based HMY Yacht Sales was sued by an unhappy buyer of a 66-foot vessel and now has to pay nearly $2 million in damages.
Brian O'Neill, a real estate developer from Rhode Island, purchased the "Breymere", a 66-foot sport fishing boat from HMY Yacht Sales, of Fort Lauderdale in 2007. A federal jury in Fort Lauderdale last week found HMY liable for negligent misrepresentation and ordered nearly $2 million in damages to the buyer. It was renamed "Double Billed."
By TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA
tolorunnipa@MiamiHerald.com
A Fort Lauderdale yacht brokerage was found liable for nearly $2 million in damages after a Rhode Island man filed suit claiming the 66-foot yacht he bought in 2007 was ``unseaworthy.''
HMY Yacht Sales, which brokered the $2.3 million yacht sale, was found liable for negligent misrepresentation by a federal jury in Fort Lauderdale last week.
``In the yachting industry, it's a very important decision -- a `sea change' if you will,'' said Alexander Bono, lead attorney for yacht buyer Brian O'Neill. ``Very few people take on the yachting industry.''
Jim Barboni, the HMY broker who led the deal, also was found liable of negligent misrepresentation.
Neither Barboni nor HMY Yacht Sales, a staple at South Florida's annual boat shows, responded to requests for comment.
O'Neill came to South Florida to purchase the 2005 66-foot sport fishing boat in March of 2007, after seeing an HMY ad on the Internet listing it for $2.6 million, according to court documents.
He met with HMY's Barboni and the yacht's previous owner, Richard Talbert, in North Palm Beach on March 18, 2007 and viewed the boat. Later that month, Talbert, Barboni and O'Neill took the vessel for a test run in Lake Worth, while a yacht surveyor conducted a sea trial to test the vessel's performance and safety. The sea trial was not conducted in the Atlantic Ocean, which is a normal practice for yachts.
PAID $2.3 MILLION
O'Neill purchased the boat for $2.3 million in April 2007, and soon began to notice problems during a trip from South Florida to New England, the suit said. One of the boat's transducers began leaking, sludge poured from the fuel tanks and the boat's hull was ``flexing,'' or violently shifting up and down. O'Neill said he had another survey of the boat done after arriving in Rhode Island, and a naval architect found a number of defects that made the vessel ``structurally unsound'' and ``unseaworthy.''
``He called it a death trap,'' Bono said.
A preliminary estimate of the cost to repair the vessel was $600,000 to $1 million, court documents show.
After an unsuccessful attempt to nullify the sale, O'Neill sued HMY in 2007, claiming the brokerage misrepresented the yacht's condition.
Court documents show that HMY attorneys based much of their defense on the ``as is'' clause contained in the sale contract, describing the situation as a case of buyer's remorse.
O'Neill's attorneys countered that the ``as is'' clause was not valid because of several misrepresentations about the boat by HMY, as well as vague language in the contract.
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They cited a soldboat.com Internet ad as one example of misrepresentation, since it described the boat as ``like new,'' and capable of ``excellent sea keeping in all conditions.''
O'Neill's lawyers also claimed that Barboni showed the yacht buyer core samples of the boat's hull that were not from the actual boat, and were not representative of the actual thickness. According to court documents, HMY did not deny showing hull samples that were not from the actual boat being purchased.
The suit originally included charges against the yacht surveyor, Thomas Price of Price Marine Services in Fort Lauderdale, but the jury found that Price was not negligent.
The jury ruled HMY Yacht Sales was 85 percent negligent and Barboni was 5 percent negligent, meaning they were liable for $1.8 million.
Jurors found Talbert was 5 percent negligent, and Talbert's company, Double Billed, was 5 percent negligent. Both Talbert and Double Billed had already settled out of court.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/05/04/1611492/angry-buyer-wins-suit-against.html#ixzz0n3Uwt7XW