Need Advice - Do we have a case & should we contact a lawyer?

[dclary]

Hello. I hope I'm posting this in the right place, please forgive me if I'm not. Here is what I have..... Back in the first week of July 2006, my husband and I bought a conversion van from a local dealership. Within a weeks time, the rear axle broke on the van and the dealership agreed to repair the axle since we had just bought it.

All has been fine until this past weekend when it broke again. Again, the dealership came and picked it up, however, now they are saying that we need to have a whole new rear and that we will have to pay for it.

They said when they had it "fixed" the first time, they just took it to a machine shop and had the axle welded and the machine shop did not guarantee their work so there is nothing they can do about it and it will cost us over $1,000 to replace the repair.

My feeling is that if they had fixed it the right way in the first place, then we wouldn't have this issue now. We are now stuck making payments on a vehicle that we can't even use. Should we contact a lawyer?

Any advice anyone could give would be greatly appreciated. If you need further information, please just let me know.

Thank you for your time,
Diana

 

[Duranie]

When you buy a used car, generally they are AS IS. The dealer is likely under no obligation to give you a warranty or fix any problems.

So if the dealer fixed it the first time, they might not have been required too and perhaps did it out of good faith.

How old is this van and how many miles are on it? I am assuming it was used and not new. Lemon laws do not cover used vehicles.

 

[dclary]

Duranie,

Hello. Thank you for responding. The van is a 1999 and has 120,000 miles on it. There was a warranty in place, however, it didn't cover the rear axle. They repaired it the first time because it had been less than a week since we bought it when it broke, 3 days to be exact. The only problem I have with this, is that it wasn't actually repaired, they chose to give a temporary fix that has now resulted in the whole rear having to be replaced.

The woman that owns the dealership came right out and told us that they didn't want to pay for a new rear axle so they had it sent to a machine shop and welded, knowing full well that the weld would never hold. I feel they were being deceptive when they fixed, and I use that word loosely, it the first time. Now, we are stuck with an $8,500 car loan on a vehicle we can't even use unless we want to shell out the money to have the rear replaced.

Thank you again for all of your help.

Take care,
Diana