Being Sued re Finance on Vehicle I sold

yaddabing

Please help me, this is my first post and I broke my arm last week so my typing isn't great:(

I bought a lorry back in 2005 (I can't remember the exact date) and I sold the lorry in 2007. In feb 2006 I did a vehicle check with mycarcheck.com and the vehicle came back clean.

This morning I recieved a letter from the lady that I sold it to solicitors saying that there was outstanding finance on the vehicle which she has paid and now I owe her £2,376. The letter includes all the loan agreements which they made with the guy I bought it off. They are saying that I am in breach of the sale of goods act as I did not have the right to sell the goods.

I checked the vehicle, the lady I sold it to did no checks. The finance company is saying that she has to claim off me, and I have to claim off the guy who took out the finance. Is this right?

I can not atm find my receipt - it was 5 years ago - how long should I keep the recipt for?

Am I liable for this money?

Thank you for any help

maninthestreet

Are you a dealer or was this a private sale? The Sale of Goods act does not apply to private sales.

yaddabing

It was a private sale

vaio

It depends what sort of finance, if it’s on hire purchase you are in the clear as s22 of the Hire Purchase Act 1964 (embodied as s27 of schedule 4 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974) says the first innocent purchaser has good title to goods on which there is outstanding finance but only if they have no knowledge of the finance.

Full text about a third of the way down this link http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk/content...&filesize=1773

Do you know what sort of finance agreement it is?

mikey72

When you say "private sale" of the lorry, what sort of lorry was it, and did you have no commercial use of it at all, even self employed?

vansboy

You are 'supposed' to maintain business records for 6 years (at least), so do you have the invoice tucked away in the filling cabinet, or wherever you might keep things for business.

VB

yaddabing

It was horsebox - never used commercially. I am a civil servant, not employed in any way with horses. We owned the lorry 2 years and it is the only lorry I have ever sold in my life. As I am not a business legally should I still have the receipt?

The finance is for a loan of £1k for 6 months, he used the lorry as security. It was a Fixed Sum Loan agreement regulated by the consumer credit act 1974. He got a nice APR of 555.4%

They issued him a bill of sale for the vehicle. When I bought it the lorry had private plates on and he told me that the V5 was with VOSA getting the plates changed - i believed him, nagged him constantly about documents, gave up and got new ones. Turns out now that the V5 was with the finance company. I now know it was stupid buying it without documents.

I can't actually remember when I bought the lorry and there is a chance that it was before he took the finance agreement out.

Thanks again everyone

mikey72

Private sale from yourself then, maybe your buyer was too keen to pay off the finance.
I think the only way to go is proper legal advice yourself I'm afraid.

vansboy

As you are a private person, not a business or motor trader, then it would be difficult to claim against you, for ANY outstanding finance, at this stage.

Assuming the 'checks' you did were with HPI, or similar, you'll have even more to prove things, if you need to. They will be able to go back in their systems to prove this. A charge may well apply, so I wouldn't bother unless you were really forced to.

Assuming there's not been previous communication from the solicitors, either ignore the letter, or a polite reply saying that you are unable to help them & suggest they seek redress from elsewere.

You may even want to check your home insurance policy for Legal Expenses Cover. This will offer free help & advice, to some extent, at no cost to you.

VB

magpiecottage

If you are a Civil Servant, are you a member of CSMA? If so, their legal helpline is 0845 640 5286

far2812

Hi this happened to us on a car - I will find the thread for you.

Basically - you were unaware of the situation with outstanding finance and purchased the vehicle in good faith. You then utilised it, decided to sell it and sold it in good faith.

There is no law that states that you have to do a finance check on the car - at the moment it is just advisory,

Basically - you just need to write back to the person and say that you were completely unaware that there was any outstanding finance on it - you most certainly would not have bought it yourself and you sold it to her in good faith without the knowledge that there was any outstanding finance.

Basically it stays with the person who now has the vehicle. It is up to her to prove that you KNEW there was os finance on it.

Sad for her - but not your problem now!

Let me know if you want to know more about our situation.