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THE LOG | May 14 - May 27, 2021 | 5
THELOG.COM
LEGAL ADVICE
ask a maritime attorney By David Weil
California’s Boating and Fishing News
Founded in 1971 NO. 1154
Is there an argument for fraud, and should I be worried about breaking a contract?
MAY 14 – MAY 27, 2021
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QUESTION:
I am in the process of purchasing a boat through a yacht broker. According to the online listing information, the boat had new bottom paint and a lot of other work completed recently. However, when I had the boat hauled out for the survey it was clear that the bottom had not been painted in a few years and most of the other work advertised in the listing was also incomplete. The seller and the broker explained the error by claiming that they were working from a previous listing when the boat was offered for sale a few years ago, and they discounted the purchase price for me to compensate for the problem. But several days before the deal was scheduled to close I decided that I did not want to buy a boat that had been fraudulently misrepresented, so I backed out of the purchase. My broker now advises that I will lose my deposit since I had already signed the “final acceptance” section on the purchase contract. This seems ridiculous in light of the misrepresentations in the listing information, and I am considering legal action against the broker and the seller for fraud. What are my options in a case like this?
See ATTORNEY, page 7
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Eight-year-old Chihuahua/Pekingese Baxter catches some rays and some snoozes at the Hotel Marina Coral Ensenada, onboard the Kohi, a Catalina 36.
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ANSWER: Our reader is considering legal action for fraud, but he must also deal with the possibility of legal action against him for breach of contract as a consequence of backing out of the purchase. Let’s look at each of these issues separately. We can start our analysis of the possible fraud with a simple observation. There is a difference between lying and committing a fraud, and you can’t sue someone for lying to you. Let’s look at this in more detail. The boat was represented as having recent bottom work and
Back in Action It’s been more than a year since the Log has received a Log abroad submission. Sheila Clevenger submitted this photo taken at Café 1535 in Baja California. She said it is their favorite anchorage in Baja.
