Articles Posted in General Lemon Laws

In the United States, a car that has been labeled a “lemon” has significant problems. Often times, the car manufacturer has been unable to fix the vehicle after numerous repair attempts. Usually, each state has its own lemon laws (such as the Texas Lemon Law). In Canada, however there is currently no similar law that protects the selling of “lemons.”

Since there is not a law in Canada that prohibits the selling of “lemons,” Canadian consumers may be unaware that they are purchasing a defective car. It has been reported that more than 130 lemons have been sold to Canadian consumers. The act of exporting lemon cars from one geographic location to another is also better known as lemon laundering. Here, manufacturers are exporting lemons from the United States and reselling it to Canadian residents without properly disclosing the lemons status of the vehicle.

The Manitoba government (Manitoba is a province in Canada) previously had no plans on adding, changing, or amending any legislation that would address this issue. Now, it has reconsidered the issue and an amendment may be tabled as early as next spring.

What do you do when your brand new vehicle is already out of commission and you purchased the vehicle new in Georgia? If this scenario sounds familiar to you, then the Georgia Lemon Law might be helpful in your case.

In Georgia, anyone who has purchased, registered, or leased a new vehicle gains protection against recurring defects. A new vehicle is covered under this law for the first 12 months after the day the car was delivered or the first 12,000 miles of use.

If a problem keeps occurring even after numerous attempts to repair it, the car buyer may apply for an arbitration hearing in order to decide if the buyer is entitled to a refund or replacement vehicle.

As we say goodbye to 2007, I have compiled a list of top 5 Texas Lemon Law articles I’ve written this year. The purpose of this is to re-cap articles that I find is helpful for consumers who may be stuck with a lemon car.

1) Lemon Laundering — this article defines what lemon laundering is about and also provides a background on how the coin is termed.

2) Tricks that car manufacturers, dealers, and service centers use to avoid liability under the Texas Lemon Law.

The state of Wisconsin is considering a puppy lemon law to protect consumers from puppies or animal with health problems that are unknown to the buyer and were not disclosed prior to the time of purchase by the seller. This will help combat puppy mill establishments and also shift the responsibility over to sellers of puppies and other animals.

This type of law is aimed to avoid a situation where a consumer purchases a puppy/animal and later finds out that the animal has health problems that requires thousands of dollars in subsequent medical bills.

Currently, the Texas Lemon Law does not officially cover animal or puppy lemon laws. I would find it difficult for Texas to mimic or follow suit because the current Texas Lemon Law is being administered by the Texas Department of Transportation to adjudicate defective lemon vehicle claims.

Often times, consumers who purchased lemon cars call my office to seek guidance under the Texas Lemon Law, but I have yet to encounter a potential client that has done this before…

To signify that the vehicle she purchased is a lemon, Christy Direnzo painted yellow lemons and the car dealership’s name on a car she purchased from DJ Enterprises. Thereafter, she parked it near the dealership to warn other car buyers. When she purchased the car, she was informed it only needed $300 worth of repairs. She soon found out it needed approximately $1,500 in repairs.

Another car buyer in Charleston, South Carolina, Mary Grodjeski, also bought a truck from the same dealership. A few weeks later, the transmission and engine went out. Both women tried to take the vehicles back to the dealership in order to get their money back, but were refused. The dealership claims that the vehicle was sold “as-is.”

Jalopnik, an online website dedicated to car fanatics, recently posted a guide to lemon laws. Although the discussion on this article did not mention specific Texas Lemon Law, it is still worth a good read to learn about general lemon laws and other related laws that might be helpful to consumers with broken cars.

The article also mentions information about the Magnuson Moss Act, one way arbitration programs, and the Better Business Bureau’s (BBB) AutoLine Lemon Law program. Unfortunately, the article attributed Kate Moss to being the co-author of the Magnuson Moss Act — it is actually Frank E. Moss.

Last month, I compared the current Texas Lemon Law with Australia’s upcoming lemon law and also provided information on how Australia’s new lemon law invites feedback from the Australian public.

This morning, I received notice of a public hearing at the Wangaratta (Australia) forum yesterday, where consumers and the public are being asked to provide input and ideas of what requirements to include and exclude in the lemon law for new cars.

So far, it seems like Consumer Affairs Minister, Tony Robinson is doing a great job of investigating the issues surrounding the responsibly of drafting a car lemon law that would be beneficial to the people it is intended to help, consumers. At the forum, Mr. Robinson states that a motor car is the second largest purchase that Victorians make. He also mentions that currently in Australia, most car manufacturers are only required to repair defects, not replace or refund broken cars.