Legal rights of a buyer

[Doug1]

Does anyone know what my rights might be in this case. I saw a boat for sale through a broker. Was told that everything was in full working order. I visited liked the boat made an offer suject to survey and sea trial which after some negotiation through the broker was accepted by the owner. I paid my deposit as requested to the broker and organised the surveyor and sea trial date. Just ahead of the date for this I received a call to say that the owner had found a problem when he had visited the boat to prepare for the survey and that a fuel pump needed changing which he would do. Everything was communicated through the broker but I was told that he was apologetic and asked if we could delay while he fixed it.

We waited patiently and after another 3-4 weeks were told the problem had at last been fixed and to go ahead and rearrange the surveyor and sea trial. We duly did and this time the night before were called to say that when the broker had called the owner to remind him of our visit he confessed that the pump had not been changed and therefore we could not do the sea trial. We went down anyway to look at the boat and it does indeed seem to be a fuel pump. Speaking to Volvo it requires their input to sort out the diagnostics and replace the pump, but the cost is reasonable and everything could be done within a week. I offered to pay for the dianostic trip by the Volvo engineers if the owner covered the pump and let it be known that if this was the issue I would be open to covering it once we had been able to complete the survey and sea trial. He has refused my help and simply says he wants to handle it himself and won't be able to do anything until the new year. The dealer is exasparated with him and has offered to return my deposit.

Does anyone know whether having agreed a deal and paid my deposit I have any rights to force the owner to do anything or am I simply left to wait and see or alternatively to look elsewhere?

 

[Baddox]

I’ve no idea about your legal rights but the post deserves bumping back up the page.

If I were in your position, I would be asking if the owner was serious about selling the boat and how much I want it. He’s not behaving in a very gentlemanly fashion making promises then reneging on them; how much do you want this boat? Has the fuel pump caused other problems like leaking diesel into the engine oil which thins it so much that unseen engine damage has occurred? The broker’s attitude looks far more professional and commendable, even though he faces losing a sale and the commission.

Are you in a hurry to get the boat and use it over winter, or could you use this quiet period to look at other boats on the market in time for spring?
Good luck.

 

[jfm]

Your rights arise in contract law not tort so your rights are whatever it says in the contract.

Without seeing the contract no-one can say, but if this is a normal-ish boat sale then at this point in proceedings you have exchanged contracts to buy the boat and he is obliged to sell, under certain conditions. I'm assuming English law btw.

So, you could, for example, set a firm date for seatrial, say 2-3 weeks from now, in writing, and tell him that his refusal to do a ST on that date combined with his other failures to do ST will be taken by you to be a failure on his part to honour his obligations under the contract.

Now, what does that actually mean? It means that means you can sue him for your losses. Thing is, and this is the biggie, if the boat is broadly at the right price you haven't suffered any loss in the eyes of the law. Of course if it is a new Feadship for €100k then your losses are €39.90m, but in the real world the boat is presumably priced ok hence your losses are zero. So you would win the legal proceedings, but your award of loss reimbursement would be zero, hence it would be pointless

Reality is therefore that you should take your deposit back and walk away, if you conclude the guy is just trying to frustrate the deal. In law, you cannot force him to do the deal even if there is a binding contract. (There is a legal remedy called specific performance, under which the court would force him to handover the boat to you upon payment of the money by you, but you wouldn't get that here)

 

[Tam Lin]

Take the money, don't waste any more time. There are plenty of other boats.

 

[Cashbuyer]

Leave well alone and look elsewhere. The seller sounds like a time wasting tw*t and you'll have nothing but problems. Walk away.

 

[petem]

If the seller is baulking at the cost of this repair then what else has he scrimped on over be years. Walk away.

 

[gjgm]

Leave well alone and look elsewhere. The seller sounds like a time wasting tw*t and you'll have nothing but problems. Walk away.

There rarely are other boats that match, though.
We dont really know why it is taking so long.. he might be a very very busy person and has indeed forgotten, or it could be that the local VP agents are super busy as boats come out of the water...I dont think I would assume it is indifference on the part of the seller, however frustrating for the OP.
I think the point about doing it himself is ok.. it is his boat still; he may not want some total stranger fiddling about with the engines.
The slight worry though is that he might have had someone look at the problem and there is a bigger problem that will indeed take longer to sort out, and he doesnt want you to know.
If you can find out from the broker who services the boat (he might already have the service records), that might be worth exploring.
All in all though, I cant see the merit in leaving your money with the broker, who has very fairly offered to return the deposit. It might mean you lose the boat , but you can always look again, and I guess you wont be doing a whole lot of boating if in UK over the next few weeks?

 

[volvopaul]

There are plenty if boats for sale with not enough buyers .
From a Volvo point if view it sounds like the common rail pump has failed and this happens for many reasons one if which is dirty fuel. I'd be walking away from it as the boat could be a can of worms .
If you want to pm me some details , engine model boat etc I can elaborate a bit more .

On this subject I paid approx £1000 for a weekend in the south if France to view a boat , all was good I signed a contract then the buyer stalled and is still stalling now so I wasted my money going to look and I cannot get anything back either from him or the broker. The boat has debts on it which the broker did not look into prior to us viewing yet I asked all the legal stuff prior to going out to sof.

I asked myself should I have paid a deposit first with both parties signing a contract ? Not sure as had the boat been a pile of poo would I get my deposit back just because I didn't like it. Again it's in the contract so I doubt it unless I had a survey and sea trial that brought up faults which I then would have been entitled to my deposit back . A tricky one when going Abroad looking as any trip can be a waste.

 

[beejay190]

Don't know if this helps but I recently sold my boat privately. The buyers clearly were not tyre kickers. I did not ask for a deposit - I took the view that if they were willing to pay a surveyor ( and he was there for a whole day ) then that was sufficient for me.
If I buy another boat I am going to adopt the same approach - and hopefully also buy privately as you can learn so much more about the boat and how it has been treated by simply judging the character of the owner and the manner in which your questions are answered.