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wrote:
I hope that this is a good lesson to those in the industry.
Lying about the condition of a boat you sell may not produce the
intended results. I'll bet that MarineMax thought that they had just
clipped another pigeon. It looks like the pigeon won the battle in the
end.

Chuck, I know you are in the industry. The title of the thread seems to
indicate that you think that this was excessive.

What makes you feel that way?

You made a very quick leap from an assumption that the title "seems to
indicate" something to asking me to defend what you presumed the title
must have meant.

"Ouch!" means that for even a company as large as Marine Max, a $2.5mm
settlement, (plus attorney fees for both sides etc that will probably
bring the total to $3mm) is a good sized bite out of the bottom line.

There was a way to sell this boat properly, and that I would have
defended. In fact, we don't really know from the news account how this
boat was sold, with what specific disclosures, and/or whether the judge
knew anything at all about boats.

If I were selling a boat that had been damaged and repaired, I would
use a verbal disclosure that would go something like this:

"Mr. and Mrs. Prospect, a lot of dealers might be afraid to tell you
what I'm about to say, but you need to know that this particular boat
was damaged during shipment from the manufacturer. As a result of a
collision between two trucks on the freeway, we had to replace or
repair items and/or areas W, X, Y, and Z. The work was done in a
factory authorized warranty yard and we have had an independent marine
surveyor, Ms. N. Itpick, examine the work and pronounce that the boat
has beeen restored to original structural standards. If this boat is of
interest to you, we would encourage you to engage a marine surveyor of
your own choosing to examine the areas that were repaired and confirm,
to your satisfaction, that the only difference between the current
condition of this new boat and one that had never been damaged during
transit
is the outstanding price we're willing to offer you on this particular
vessel."

If we were still moving forward after the verbal disclosure, I'd want
to be sure there was a written statement in the closing file, signed by
the buyer, summarizing and acknowledging the verbal disclosure and
stating that, in exchange for a price consideration (*very important*,
legally), the buyer has chosen to proceed with the purchase. The price
consideration is important because if the buyer agrees to buy as is but
doesn't save any specific money for doing so, an attorney can argue
that the buyer signed away his rights without compensation.

Like I said, we don't have any idea how the boat was sold- but if it
were sold with a full disclosure and encouragement to the buyer to seek
independent confirmation of the vessel's condition I would side with
the seller in this dispute. It isn't the seller's job to talk people
who want to buy something out of buying it- but it is the seller's
responsibility to make sure that the buyer's attention is directed to
any unusual history or condition impacting the item being sold.

If it were sold with a statement, "we had to touch up a few scratches
on the port side after the boat arrived" and it later developed that
the boat had required $200,000 in hull repairs (for instance) I would
side with the buyer. That would appear to be the buyer's position in
this matter, and the judge obviously found the buyer's attorney and
argument more compelling than the seller's.

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