Auto Insurance Claims: Car deal gone bad, bad feelings, check stub

Question
Hello,
We had sold my husband camero to his friend's girlfriend and the original agreement was for 2500, but my husband let them take it after they paid 1000 and wrote them a bill of sale just in case they got pulled over or what not. My husband did not sign the title over to them.  They kept the car for about a month and a half, then notified us that there was something wrong with it,(that wasnt going on before), and didnt want it anymore.  Well my husband told them  that he was going to have to wait until he resold the car and then he would give them the cash back.  They are now threatening to take us to court because they have the bill of sale and the check stub. My question is: Can they sue us? My thinking is that we were nice enough to agree to pay them back when they didnt want the car after they messed around and did something wrong with it.

Answer
Hi Meagan,


The best way to lose friends is to do business with them. You have a situation that is not unique and it happens quite often.

Your husband should have never wrote them a bill of sale for the whole amount. Now, I have been burned like this from my brother and others. My brother owed me $1,000.00 for the car. He took it, used it and then sold it. His thinking was since he no longer had the car, he didn't owe me the money. This created some very bad feelings and has gone back 20 years.

The bigger problem here is how were these people insured? Was that through your insurance company? You state you still have the title, which means to me the car is still registered to you. Do you not realize that anything that happens with that car out oif your control is your responsibility? Parking tickets etc.

If these people are into drugs and get busted, your car is confiscated.

Look I am not telling you this was a bone headed thing to do. It just sounds like your husband and you were naive and trusted these "friends." These people from how you describe it are in my opinion are slime and don't deserve you as friends.

If they go to sue you, it might be interesting, because the question would come up; why is it you have the title and it wasn't transferred?

I can not tell you the legal remedies because I am not a lawyer and cannot give legal advice.

I would suggest however that you write me at robo14@aol.com and I might have some suggestions that I don't want to air publicly.

Rob