More details to this question:
I purchased a storage building, metal carport, play ground equipment and patio furniture from my next door neighbor (a male app. 30 years old) approximately 45 days ago. He approached me and offered to sell all of this to me because he said the house was going to be in foreclosure in a few months and he was moving and didn't want to move this stuff. Come to find out his mother had moved to Texas 6 months earlier and it was her possessions not his. He was still living in the house with her permission and he is in a drug rehab now. His mother came home to visit and found her stuff sold and filed a report with Sheriff's Dept but didn't press charges on her son. She now wants me to return everything that I purchased. My husband and I paid him $3550. and had to miss 4 days of work combined to move things and spent $400 more on having the metal carport moved. I paid cash for all of it and only have a few text messages from the son about selling me things and stating what he originally paid for it and how much he would sell it to me for. I am not the only person this happened to there is 2 others that he sold to also. What are my rights?
1 ANSWER
If you paid for the goods without any reason to suspect, and no reaonable means of checking, that the son was not the true owner, you will probably be considered what is known as a "bona fide purchaser for value", and will be able to keep the stuff. The mother would have to get redress from her son. If, however, a Judge or jury finds that you knew or should have known that the son was not the true owner, than you will have to return the goods to the mother, and you will have to seek redress from the son (who probably, based on what you've written, has no assets with which to pay you.)
Answered on Aug 12th, 2015 at 11:49 AM