Question

You want to sell your car. You post it online and get multiple responses. The buyer, Bobby Ray, who offers you the most and you want to sell the car to contacts you on Saturday evening at 7 pm. Banks do not open until Monday morning but you are leaving town Sunday until Thursday.

You want to put together a contract to ensure that Bobby Ray buys your car for the agreed price at the agreed time. What do you need to have in the contract to make sure it is enforceable

Answer 1

As per the law, ‘all agreements are contracts if they are made by free consent of the parties competent to contract, for a lawful consideration and with a lawful object, and are not hereby expressly declared to be void’.

An agreement enforceable by law is called a contract.

The essential elements in an agreement to make it a contract (make the agreement enforceable) are as follows:

• Proper offer and proper acceptance with the intention to create legal relationship – Offer and acceptance must be made in the manner specified in law
• Lawful consideration – The consideration for the contract should not be unlawful
• Lawful object – The object of the contract should not be anything that is unlawful or prohibited
• Capacity to contract – The parties to contract must obtain legal age and be competent to contract
• Free consent – Parties should agree without any kind of force or coercion
• Agreements should not be declared expressly as void or illegal – Law specifies some contracts as void or illegal. The agreement should not be such
• Certainty of meaning – The terms should not be ambiguous
• Possibility of performance of an agreement – Should not be impossible to perform
• Necessary legal formalities – If the contract requires to be registered, it has to be registered

In the given situation, the contract with Bobby Ray should address all these aspects and signed, for it to become enforceable under law.