I just puked after skimming through this endless thread.
Please answer a simple question (I think others are dying to know as well) : did Roy (as he claims) give you prior notice that a PI was looking into your car, and what action did you immediately take? And if that information was given to you, why did you not state it in your initial account here. Thanks - your answer will clear up a lot.
Also as another note, it looks like the original leasing company took a massive down payment on the vehicle. Most leases for any exotic are 10% down, 20% on a purchase. Bad credit or shady character ups the down payment. So in this case obviously this guy was shady but they took the chance in consdieration of giant deposit. So sure enough, the guy skips the country, but guess what? The leasing company has $50,000 in their pocket. This is now a big profit center deal for the leasing company. Think about it: If the leasing company can get the car back, they can sell it or lease it again, AND, keep that $50,000 as pure profit. In addition, right now, they're using the $50K as the seed capital to go into (likely) Federal Court and get this stuff done. Again, ex parte relief with a vehicle seizure across state lines is not easily undertaken and IS NOT cheap by any means. But again, the leasing company sees it as: 1. Invest $25K in fees to goto court, get the car back, and be right where there were before +$25K 2. Spend even less perhap and profit even more. Maybe their lawyers are already on fat retainer and they get the car +$50K 3. If it gets too expensive keep the balance of down payment as their profit and write off the car on their tax return as loss due to fraud/theft. 4. Do all of the above and if it doesn't work hope their insurance kicks in and pays them out on the full loss of the car, and again they keep the $50K down payment as profit. However it looks like in this case their insurance probably laughed at them. So you see, if this was case with usual 10% down there wouldn't have been any of this nonsense of the court taking the car and stuff, because they would have to invest alot of money beyond what they already lost. But unfortunately for Josh, Mr. Skip the Country left the leasing company the big cash pile they need to goto court and keep the car tied up for a long time, and perhaps even persuade the judge to send it back to them. At this stage I'd say it almost 50/50. If the car had been in dealer's hands still the leasing company would likely get it back, but because there was an end party purhcaser, the judge may decide otherwise. But the judge MADE THE ORDER to sieze the car so he's admitting the case has merit, and that the leasing company MAY succeed on its claims to return title/posession to the leasing company. This is why again, Josh needs to get his money back from the dealer and cherish his 3 months of memories with his Gallardo. I wouldn't want the car back myself either. It's cursed now. Yes notice was given, about 72 HOURS. However it's not clear what the notice was. According to Roy, if I remember correctly, the only thing he told Josh was that some company called him about there being a potential problem with the title/ownership, and that he (Roy) as a courtesy did not release to the leasing company any of Josh's details. This is fair though and doesn't reflect badle on either party, because all Roy could relay would be what the leasing company called him and said. It looks like the leasing company had their legal ducks in a row and had the court matter ready to go, but to save on attorneys fees and court costs would try every other cheap avenue like just picking up the phone and asking Roy for his customer's info, or demanding Roy pay them back. The leasing company has smart lawyers and in calling Roy probably didn't give their game plan away that if Roy didn't do something to help they were moving onto Step 5 which was going into court to try and get the car back, and have it immediately seized and held pending their case. So neither Roy probably had it in his head that 'in 72 hours this car will be seized' nor did Josh. Both probably just figured the leasing company was just poking around, and probably would just take a loss or claim it on their insurance. However because of the above and the $50K they have money to invest in recovering the car.
I feel so bad for Roy and Josh in this situation. It's one of those really really bad situations where you really can't make anybody happy without delving deep into your pocket book. And every second that that car is not in possession of Josh, that's a potential asset that could be utilized to make $$. Whether it be giving rides, borrowing against it and investing it, it really doesn't matter. Every second that car isn't in possession is another potential lost opportunity. And for what? Complete bull****, that's what. If you guys want to read about the worst case of our infamous "due process" system at work, read the Joe Francis story. I feel really bad for the guy He's been in prison for nearing a year, on bull**** charges, that's costing him millions to fight, and here's the kicker: He has no bail. http://www.meetjoefrancis.com/legalstory/ Read for yourself.
He's been out a couple weeks, I've seen him on TV several times specifically regarding the Eliot Spitzer/Kristen fiasco. Certainly been jerked around by the "system" but he'll be OK.
The story is out of date. He bailed out and is back in Florida. He always had the ability to bail out of Nevada but had been faced with immediate extradition to Florida. -mick
With all this drama................................................................ Image Unavailable, Please Login
You probably don't have a choice. You may get the car, money or nothing. Seems anything is possible. -mick
Thread stays open, at least for now. Keeps it all in one place. Closing would just cause another one to pop up, then another, and another... DM
Also to Josh, from what I understand you hadn't yet registered or titled the car when you were driving it, as you were waiting to do it in another state or something? Well failure to record the title or even making an attempt to record the title could cause you problems in court as well. One other question I have about this whole thing, but it may have been covered and I missed it - Was the car ever retitled to any of the dealers in the process of the vehicle moving around? Or was the title sent by the leasing company to Mr Skip the Country the one that's still floating around out there? Because when talking about Bona Fide Purchasers, there is also what's known as the 'race' as in a race to the courthouse to record a deed on property if we're talking about real estate, and the race statutes. Basically, in a case like this, you want to win that race and want to not just HOLD the title but also RECORD IT by registering the car and having it re-titled to your in your state. As Premiere Motorcars SF stated there are different states that recognize 'title in hand' etc. but Josh, by not regsistering and retitling the car you at even more of a disadvantage of reclaiming it back through the courts.
That's really interesting. Thanks for taking the time to post so much information to educate us all. Even if he was going to register/title the car in another state wouldn't you need or want to do that fairly quickly? 3 months passing without filing seems like a long time to have not done so.
Wow I used to live in Metrotown before there even was a Metrotown. It was called Old Orchard then. Maywood Street and Patterson Avenue to be exact. That'd be the Burnaby side though. Got out 20 years ago when the traffic went nuts and the high rises were built and property taxes went beserk. Unfortunately the traffic has ended up following me to the suburbs so I'm now facing the same dilemna. So exactly what kind of business do you own that you can spend most of your day F-chatting in your private office while the employees mind the day to day? I'd love to drop in and say Hello as I frequently pass through that way. Back to the thread(well sort of)....Here in Beautiful British Columbia we hold licensed car resellers to a far higher standard than the average Joe Blow curbing his car. Vehicles must be sold unencumbered unless stated, be roadworthy (especially with respect to braking and steering), and pass emissions(based on geography). All dealers are required to carry liability insurance in the event Josh's scenario should unfold. I believe liability is underwritten collectively through all member dealers. Based on some of the comments posted US law governing car dealers vary widely from State to State. I had been under the impression that with the Title system the holder of the clean Title owned outright the vehicle unencumbered. That's certainly what US Customs looks at when you export a vehicle from your country. That's also why I've avoided purchasing from States that currently do not Title. Josh, I simply do not understand why you would want to publicly air your nightmare. I cannot comprehend as to how this publicity could ever benefit you. For those of us following your drama it does provide some insight but for the most part I believe it is mere entertainment or at best a casual diversion. I can't even formulate a comment with respect to your handing over this amount of money to virtual strangers without first conducting a whole lot of due diligence. Still, you were lucky enough to have bought from a bona fide dealer so hopefully all works out okay for you. Here's to a better April, Steve
Alright no more posts about Joe Francis, he's arrogant jerk anyways. On the title that is a good question. Waiting to record the title doesn't nullify your rights, but it may limit them. In a normal auto transaction, like Premiere SF said he has 30 days to register the car and take new title as a dealer in his state or face problems. That's a dealer though. As a private purchaser, it would be interesting to know what problems you may face by holding the title for 90 days, and then a big problem like this pops up? Anyone? P.S. Arium, you may want to read the whole thread. I know it sucks cause it's long but you'll see he didn't hand money over to strangers, they were Cats Exotics, very active dealers here on Fchat with a track record, and also licensed auto dealers. Also due diligence, scroll back to my post that reference the wikipedia listing on bona fide purchaser, as in private party citizen purchaser. His only due diligence as required by any court would be the standard of "such inspections as ought reasonably to have been made" which translates only into checking that Cats was registered dealer, and the the car wasn't obviously stolen. Such sign could have been the car had a popped ignition and had to be started with a screwdriver, and Cats told him 'don't worry about, the ignition was problematic, we'll get you a new lock and keys after your purchase the car'. In such a case a reasonable person could resanoably assume that would be a serious reason to avoid the sale of that car and NOT purchase that car. In this case though the car was perfect, and came with what looked ot be clear title. That absolves Josh of any further due diligence legally. Non-legally anybody could do as much DD as they want, maybe even background check Roy who knows right? But most people goto a car dealer and pay them money, get a car, and get on with life enjoying their car. Any more due diligence needed to be equired on part of a private citizen purchaser would disenfranchise every average american, housewife, etc. buying any car from any dealer anywhere. Dealer licensing is done to ABSOLVE the public from due diligence, since most of the public has better things to do, or are not lawyers, or simply can't comprehend the issues, reference 30+ pages already and still things unfolding.
I think you should concentrate on protecting the money you may still have, go buy a couple Blasters and hunker down its gonna be a long night !! Image Unavailable, Please Login
In my experience dealing with cars here are the steps taken after the car has passed all visual and mechanical inspections: 1- Run carfax and autocheck reports. 2- Check with police to see if the car has any issues, the local police and the national database they have access to is often far more informative than carfax or autocheck. This is a service that COSTS NOTHING, Mr. Cats has proven in the past to be very adept at getting access to police records, both legally and illegally so this should have been no problem for him especially since he was a police officer himself. In this instance if Mr. Cats would have spent less time searching through mine and other forum members criminal records, and would have simply checked the vin # of the car in question, he would have realized that the car was REPORTED STOLEN ON DECEMBER 22, 2007!
Mark: Unfortunately I have read the whole thread. Hence the comment about Josh being lucky to make his purchase through a licensed dealer. My observation was more of a concern for the whole title process and the obvious weaknesses now exposed. Different application from this though. Is there a tax advantage of running a temp dealer tag? With respect to not tranferring ownership via retitling the vehicle after sale; would one able to defer payment of state sales tax? I know that in California you still need insurance. They tell you that when you rent a car anyway. If you were planning on moving out of state soon maybe this would be a sound strategy. Unless there's a problem with the car of course. Thanks to all for the input. My eyes are now just all little wider open confidence wise to the security of the title system. Steve
Export! My employees are mostly relatives who have been in the business longer so staying out of their way (productionwise) is better most of the times. I just basically handle the financial aspect of the business. The Metrotown Condo is just a temprary set up until the house is finished. Im still waiting for someone to scream "April Fool's" at the end of this thread! But seriously, this situation is far more deeper than I first thought. Its clear that there are a lot of things left unsaid (obviously) by both parties.
This seems to be a new tidbit of info? Where did you get this info that the car was reported stolen then on that date? And could you expound on the searching through criminal records of forum members by Cats Exotics. Is there another thread on that somewhere? Or is this like secret 007 stuff, or?
