Articles Posted in General Lemon Laws

At my Texas lemon law office, I often get calls from potential clients about problems on a variety of vehicles, including SUVS, trucks, sports cars, and compact cars. However, I have yet to receive a call for electric lemon cars, possibly due to the fact that electric cars are fairly new to the auto industry and car consumer markets.

Especially with how gas prices have exponentially increased within the past year, it is expected that electric cars will have a strong impact on many consumers’ transportation choices.

In Washington, a mail carrier is finding that out that a lemon may occur in non-traditional gas vehicles also, specifically electric cars. Frost Freeman bought a Dynasty IT with the intention of using it to deliver mail while working for the Marrowstone Island Post Office. Unfortunately, 2 years after purchasing the vehicle, the vehicle doesn’t hold a charge as advertised and failed to operate in a way she she expected. Ms. Frost recently filed a lemon law claim with the Washington State Attorney General’s Office, hoping to seek a repurchase/buyback under Washington’s Lemon Law.

Jim Donovan from CBS 3 of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania recently wrote an online story regarding alternative recourses that consumers have, especially in situations where state lemon laws are inapplicable.

Specifically, Mr. Donovan properly pointed out that the federal Magnuson Moss Act may help consumers who suffer damages from being sold defective vehicles, even pre-owned or used cars with warranty.

Here, the Texas lemon law is very restrictive in terms of rebuttable presumptions and the deadline to file a claim. When a potential client comes to my office and the deadline to file a claim under the Texas Lemon Law has passed, I usually explore with the consumer on whether the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices (DTPA) or the federal Magnuson Moss Act would help them.

Action Express, a consumer advocacy group in New Jersey, recently posted a response to a consumer’s questions as to whether their used lemon car qualifies for New Jersey’s lemon law.

Although New Jersey has a provision to protect car buyers of pre-owned lemon cars, the provisions are limited. For example, the law requires that the subject vehicle must be: 7 model years or less, cost at least $3,000, and have less than 100,000 miles at the time of purchase.

The key to protecting yourself and making sure you qualify for NJ’s provision for used lemon cars?….make sure you meet the 3 requirements above and make sure the vehicle is not sold “as is.”

I often joke about how the Texas Lemon Law should be better known as the car manufacturer’s lemon law because of its bias in favor of the manufacturers and its dealers, rather than favoring or protecting automobile consumers. Today, I am happy to report that at least the Texas Lemon Law is better than Missouri’s newly proposed lemon law against fraudulent, deceptive, and misrepresentation cases.

The newly proposed Missouri Lemon Law will increase its restrictions by disallowing consumers to go after car wholesalers in court. With the new law, consumers can only pursue car dealerships and possibly the car manufacturers. The law is intended to reverse the recent Missouri Supreme Court decision that found in favor of consumers by allowing victims who are sold lemon cars to go after both the car dealer and its wholesalers. The law has not passed yet and will go to the governor of Missouri for signage.

For more information, go here.

Dave, a consumer internet blogger, recently wrote about his experience with his Ford lemon vehicle (click here for his post). Like most other consumers, Dave provided Ford with ample opportunity to do the right thing. Ford not only failed to do the right thing, but it seems that Ford has lost another loyal customer.

I wrote to Dave offering assistance and here is his response, “I appreciate your concern, but I have conceded defeat in this matter. As the ‘little guy’, I cannot compete with Ford Motor Company under the law. My belief that I was ‘doing the right thing’ by giving them the chance to repair the vehicle, ‘bit’ me, as FMC is unconcerned with ‘doing the right thing.”

If you have a Texas lemon vehicle, please make sure that you document everything. Regardless of whether you go with my law firm or my competitor, it is important that you do something to make sure that Ford or other manufacturers such as Chrysler or Mazda does not win for selling you a lemon.

In Missouri, the House recently approved a lemon law bill that limits consumer’s right to only sue the car dealer and no one else. That’s right, no one else, including the car manufacturer or others who were involved in selling the consumer the lemon vehicle.

The bill was sponsored by Republican Jay Wasson and harshly opposed by Kansas City representative John Burnett, who is a Democrat. The lemon law bill is called HB1970 and has been sent to the Senate. There is currently no calendar date for it and the proposed effective date for it is 08/28/2008.

I personally would oppose this bill because it is written too narrow. There are many situations where it is important for the consumer to have the right to sue other parties besides the car dealers in lemon law related claims, especially in resale situations.

Ever wonder what happens to life after death? Of course, I will not be analyzing such a complex issue, but in a similar line of thought,… have you ever wondered what happens to lemon cars that have been repurchased or bought back from car manufacturers? Or, ever wonder what happens to wrecked or salvaged cars?

Last week, fellow Lemon Law attorney and blogger, Jonathan Rudnick, wrote a short article that might have partially answered this hypothetical question. His article focuses on how there exists an entire market for buying and selling damaged cars.

This makes sense, because it is impractical and unprofitable for car manufacturers to simply dismantle and take lemon cars out of commission when it is so much easier to possibly sell it to another uninformed buyer who is in the market of buying a preown car. The Texas Lemon Law covers used car cases in very LIMITED situations. As a general rule, the law is intended to protect new car buyers.