MalibuScott

California buyers should beware of buying a new car out of state. California's very strong lemon law will not protect you. On a new car with high performance parts or new technology lemon law protection should be considered as important as insurance. You probably won't need it, but if you do it's good to have.

thebishman

MalibuScott

I'm 100% certain.

Cummins, Inc. v. Superior Court (***) (2005) 36 Cal.4th 478, 483. The very first paragraph of the opinion tells the story:

susman@eurogermantown.com

Yea i think it's the state you buy in.. Im not sure what California is... Maryland you have to have 3 dealer fixes for the same thing (major component.. not a speaker..), 4th times needs to be a replacement...also if it spends a certain amount of time in the shop within the 1st 15 months ( it's really been taht long since)... Again, Mercedes does well with a trade assist before any lemon law kicks in.. I had to do a CLA250 2 years ago and a long while ago on a E cab..

MalibuScott

That was then. This is now. MBUSA no longer gets involved in negotiating Lemon Law buy back claims, believe it or not. Mercedes Benz now assigns such claims to a third party vendor. I recently handled a buyback of an E63 for a neighbor and MBUSA used Stericycle Expert Solutions as its "transfer agent" (Mercedes' words). The buyback check (for about 92% of the original purchase price plus my attorney's fees) came from "Impartial Services Group, LLC" written on its "MBUSA Escrow Account." The name on the check says it all: MBUSA tries to insulate itself from the buy back process and claims it acted in bad faith by hiring an entity which itself has a division claiming to be "impartial."

This buy back was for a car that had been purchased 3 years earlier. California's Lemon Law's stiff buy back provisions protects vehicles for the full term of the new car warranty. Most states limit the length of buy back protection. For a car that is going to be lightly driven (and probably depreciate rapidly) long term buy back protection is even more important.

As to your specific point, Maryland's lemon law is better than many other states, but not as good as California. Maryland's law applies to new or leased motor vehicles (including cars, light trucks and motorcycles), registered in that state, that are less than 24 months old and have been driven less than 18,000 miles. I don't know if Maryland's lemon law protects a purchaser who bought the car in Maryland but then registered it in another state. It's possible (I haven't done the research) that such a purchaser will be without any lemon law protection altogether.

My point remains the best advice: California residents should not buy new cars outside of the state of California.

AMG 17GT

MalibuScott

No. It's written correctly.

". . . insulate itself from claims . . . it acted in bad faith . . ." Note the connective "and."

AMG 17GT

MalibuScott

Thanks for your post. I see where the ambiguity could arise. But there was no comma between "process" and "and."

The purchaser of the motorhome in the Cummins case tried to ague a similar ambiguity. The California Lemon Law applies, as it is written, to "Every manufacturer of consumer goods sold in this state and for which the manufacturer has made an express warranty." The law imposes obligations on the manufacturer, such as that it have repair locations to fix the consumer goods. Cars are considered "consumer goods" and the buyers of motor vehicles have additional protections including buy back protection.

Does the phrase "sold in this state" mean the statute applies only to vehicles sold in California, or does it mean that if the manufacturer has sold motor vehicles in California generally, then the consumer protection laws apply in favor of buyers located in California and against the manufacturer no matter where the vehicle was sold. It's a fair question that the statute can be read either way. So we call that kind of a statute "ambiguous." But for the lack of a comma I can see that what I wrote could also be considered ambiguous.

MalibuScott

Bish

Your rights are somewhat problematic. I am not a Kansas lawyer, but according to the Kansas Lemon Law statute, Title 50, chapter 6, section 645 (a)(2), a vehicle protected by the law is defined as "a new motor vehicle which is sold or leased in this state." That sounds a lot more clear than the ambiguous California statute. It would therefore not apply to a vehicle bought in another state. Perhaps there are other statutory provisions or case law that have extended Kansas' protections. (In Kansas it appears to be only for 12 months. Likewise, most states are between 12 and 24 months with an additional limit of 18,000 miles. In California it's for the length of the new car warranty.)

I hope you don't have any problems that can't be promptly fixed!

JSwan724

MalibuScott

A good question. I don't know the answer. But take the following example:

You buy your car in North Dakota. You register it in New Hampshire (one of the tax avoidance states) in the name of your Delaware LLC. You garage it in California where you have it serviced. Two days after buying the car you have a problem with the brakes. It takes 2 days to fix it and the problem goes away. Before the brake problem you put 100 miles on the car. After you've driven it 22,000 miles, 25 months later, that serious problem with the brakes occurs again. You bring it to the dealer 5 times but can't get it fixed satisfactorily. The car is in the shop for 35 days.

You'd be entitled to a buy back in California if you bought the car in California. If it was the same brake problem you could probably negotiate a buy back based on your initial purchase price, the taxes on that purchase price (between 9 & 9.5% in California) and one year's registration fees, minus a charge for usage based on a useful life of the car (under the California statute) of 120,000 miles. You'd get everything back on a $110,000 total cost purchase minus usage based on 100 miles divided by 120,000 miles ($91.67 of usage, so $109,908.33). But you can't use the California Lemon Laws. And the dealer to whom you take the car for service isn't liable. Would the manufacturer have to do the buy back? If so, based on the law of what state? And if it was a state with a limit on the buy back (18,000 miles or one or two years), you're SOL.

Buy backs are rare, but not as rare as you'd think.* And if you've got a lemon a buy back can be very important to you.

Bottom line is, the best rule is to buy the car from the dealer in the state you're in. If you find an out-of-state car, get a local dealer to trade for it and sell or lease it to you.

*Since 1990 I've lemoned three cars of my own, a 1991 500SL, a 2006 BMW 650i convertible and a 2010 BMW 535 GT.

thebishman

MalibuScott

This thread has devolved into a Lemon Law thread because there are a lot of people on here from California, the state with the strongest Lemon Laws, who are buying or being asked to buy from out-of-state dealers. And while the car is the same (a 50-state car), the rights that go with it are not.

Every out-of-state purchaser should therefore know what he’s getting into. That’s also true of out-of-state buyers from other states. The initial question is whether they’ll have any Lemon Law protection at all.

And Maryland’s Lemon Law appears to be run of the mill. I have no idea if that law would apply in the event of a purchase by someone from out-of-state who has the vehicle serviced outside of Maryland.

Sorry to hijack your thread but the information is relevant, timely and important. Any buyer who ventures out to buy a car from a dealer in another state should know what he's getting. And what he's not getting. Don't you agree?

MalibuScott

Thanks to Vic55 for moving the posts over to this thread. (Why isn't he Vic63?)

Vic55

Ill be moving the posts now, the dialogue is in order so it should read well. Please use this particular thread to discuss all issues. Thanks MalibuScott for your intel on this very important subject.

Because of the dating of the posts, they will supercede the OP's initial opening post for this thread but you all get the picture here.

Vic55

At last someone asks:

... when I met the original owners of this website back in 2000 I had a W210 E55. I joined once it was set up and the 55 nomenclature was adopted. Over the years as the engines changed, my user name did not and I just left it. Im Vic55 in many forums: Benz, BMW, Audi, Porsche, Lambo, Ferrari... so I am forever linked by my first AMG, a silver E55 that was an amazing normally aspirated beast with 349hp (the most for a sedan at that time until the venerable E39 M5 came out- I had that too).

And Im also grateful to forums like this because it really got me started with Benz and then on to BMW and Porsche plus other nameplates. I love the forums and the members as I am always a member first, the peers here are what keeps me and others informed.

thebishman

MalibuScott

My first AMG was a non turbo CL55 which I bought in 2001. It was a special order and I was told it was at the VPC on September 11, 2001. Of course I wasn't thinking about the car on that date. Picked it up several days later while we were all still shell shocked.

My first Merc was a 1971 280 SL that I bought during Easter break 1971 at WI Simonson in Santa Monica. After I bought it I drove it across the country until I graduated from law school, thence back to Southern California. I put 15,000 miles on that car in 4 months and then sold it.

Vic55

Please keep this thread on track or Ill have to move the posts to a new thread "What did we first drive when we joined"

LOLOLOL I joke I joke

Free bump!!!!!!!!!!!

thebishman

Vic55

Nah no ones fault here, Im guilty too---- Its a fine line when threads go off tangent as to if they should be altered. Almost always a thread will slightly derail or completely fall off the tracks but then get back on. The only issue with that thread was it was Sponsor based.

So in the spirit of this thread I will say this; Ive bought 31 new cars in 10 years from in state and out of state. And while I should have done some LL research I didnt knowing I had the factory warranty behind it and I just dont like to approach my purchase experience that way. This may be odd to some but I like the research, acquistion and negotiation process, obviously not as much as the owneship time but If Im afraid or go in half empty I just will probably back out pre purchase.

In almost 18 years of new car purchases (over 40) I have had zero lemons. Did I beat the odds? I have no clue. Im happy.

guynamedsean

Vic55

Not when its at the price point that we consider. These are not commodity units per se and just sitting on every lot exactly optioned as you want. Your mileage may vary but when I was shopping for my GTS, Ferraris, Bentley, Lambo, and few choice Benzes and Bimmers, I looked out of state equally. Market conditions and demand can really swing a deal tens of thousands of dollars if you shop outside of your market. A great example is some of the early adopter buyers on GTR's who paid 40 to 50k over msrp but could have bought the car out of state for maybe MSRP or 5k over; huge difference in dollars.

Obviously when I was looking for my M4 I went locally as there were quite a few on the ground but when I wanted my ED1 I looked at Ohio, Texas, and my home state.

guynamedsean