Above the Bar
Purchase and Sale Written Agreements
by Sean Hogan, Esq.
This article is for educational purposes only, so as to give the reader a general understanding of the law— not to provide specific legal advice. No attorney-client relationship exists between the reader and the author of this article. This article should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a licensed professional attorney.
P
erhaps one of the most common situations in which horse enthusiasts will find themselves involved, is the
unknown to the buyer at the time of the purchase, the horses were blind in both eyes. Subsequent to learning that the horses were blind and thus unsound, the buyer commenced a lawsuit against the seller for breach of warranty. Similarly, in Chadsey v. Greene, 24 Conn. 562, the matter brought before the court arose when a buyer, who was unfa-
Yes, ma’am, you can put the whole family on his back! But, your ad said he was a “family horse.”
y
sale or purchase of a horse. Unfortunately, when either a seller or buyer enters into this type of transaction unprepared, it can often lead to one party to the transaction being aggrieved and, as a result, lead to litigation. Connecticut courts have a history of hearing cases involving the sales of horses. Consider the facts of the following three cases, all of which arose out of the sale or purchase of a horse. In Bartholomew v. Bushnell, 20 Conn. 271, the seller sold two horses to the buyer, which were alleged that he warranted to be “sound and good.” In fact, 82
Community Horse Spring/Summer 2021
miliar with horses, sued the seller of a horse based upon the representations made by the seller’s agent. The seller was known to be a man of questionable character and he referred the buyer to his agent. The agent told the buyer that the seller was a “highly respectable man . . . who had traveled to New York to buy a nice horse or two.” The buyer, relying on this statement, then purchased “one bay horse, seven years old and warranted sound, blanket and halter included.” However, the horse turned out to be lame, and the buyer sued the seller based
