Is a deposit and a dealer's agreement to sell a contract that transfers with the sale

You are right. It becomes a question of enforcement.

 

Well, that's kind of the whole point about purchasing the assets and not the stock. I'm pretty sure there are laws the prevent discharging certain liabilities to some extent, but it doesn't cover everything.

I've bought a business before and I remember the first thing my accountant told me was that we're buying the assets, not the company/stock to avoid any liability. He told me of a client of his who bought a transmission repair business in which he acquired the company itself instead of just the assets. Further down the line he starts getting sued by former customers whose transmissions were repaired very poorly, with used parts instead of new ones, etc. Financially ruined the guy and he committed suicide, I think.

So yeah, I can see how it's possible the new dealership doesn't have to honor your contract. Then again, I'm not sure what the terms of being a Ferrari franchise is. Maybe they would force you to honor certain liabilities when getting the franchise transferred to them. Then again, if the pretext is merely if the car makes it to production, you might be out of luck unless they guaranteed you that they would fill your order in a certain order of allocation or within a given time frame.

I'm actually a bit surprised that they wouldn't just honor it anyway. It's not like a 458 sells for over MSRP anymore. I'd think they'd be glad to sell you one at MSRP.

 

You make sense to me.

As a businessman going out of your way to take care of new customers seems like a no-brainer way to grow your business.

Best.