Consumer Law, Warranties brother in law breaches oral contract

[msmith]

On Dec 12, 2007, after being hit and having total hip/knee replacement, with no medical insurance and never having a job in his 44 yrs, my brother in law made and oral agreement to reimbursement and compensate my husband and I, if we provided him with food, shelter, clothing, full support for 4 months(2 of which were 24 hr bed ridden care), transportation to and from doctors and lawyer meetings for 1 1/2 yrs. I did all the paperwork for the lawyers/trying to get him medical coverage, a picture ID, ETC...A set amount was not dicussed until May 2008 when coming from mediation with the lawyers he stated to me, in front of a witness, that he was going to give me $10,000.00 and that I would be the first one he paid. On August 19, 2008 he got his settlement check. He had no ID so he told me as soon as his ID came in the mail he would pay me. He got the check cashed somehow and about a week later brought me $2000.00 and said as soon as my ID gets here I'll pay you the rest. He purchased 2 houses(shacks) but still had over $40,000.00 left after the total amount was paid for the two houses. A week late we went to the motel were he was staying and he told me, you'll have to wait till I get my first time home buyers credit back. I told him that was not our agreement and when you get your ID I want what you said you would pay me. Another week goes by, in these 2 weeks he's spending alot of money on drugs, partying, giving out money etc... Well his ID came and we went to see him and he says "You'll have to wait till I get the deed to my house and I will take out a mortgage to pay you". When I said "that was not our agreement, if it wasn't for me you would not be walking now, or got a settlement because you would not do what the lawyers needed done, I did it". He looked right at me and said "So What". I told him I would see him in court. I waited another 2 weeks and started the process which is to send him a Notice for Demand of Payment. When he received this letter he sent a message through a mutual friend that the certified letter just cost us our $8000.00 because he was not going to pay us a dime. I really do not think he intended to pay us any more than the $2000.00 even though he said he was. If we take him to small claims court for the maximum amount of $7500.00 do we have a chance of winning on this oral. He has never taken responsibility for himself, he has lived off his brothers his whole life. I don't even like him and did not like him when he was hurt, but my husband ask me to care for him so I did. He never even looked at us and said Thank You. Need to know soon so I can finish filing the paperwork for small claims. thanks
msmitty

 

[Michael Wechsler]

You certainly do have a good chance of winning something in small claims court if what you tell me is true. Yes, you will only have the ability to sue for $7,500 but it might be worth the trip. An oral agrement is as enforceable as the written, it's just that there is more proof needed to win your case as a written agrement makes thing simple. You already have a $2,000 payment from him as proof that the amounts you paid were not a gift or the value of services were not worth $10,000. The problem you have is that you were asking for $2,500 per month for generic "services" and you'll probably want to show all the value you provided for the services, e.g. put in a "rent" equivalent, food, etc. He may not even show up in court. If you can get an affidavit (or better yet, have witnesses appear) as to the agreement, you should have them present. This is not going to be a simple case as the nature of this agreement is very vague, open ended and amorphous - but you will probably end up with something. How does your husband feel about suing his brother? If he's on board, I can imagine that this will be a factor for the arbitrator/judge to use in determining credibility.