Ridiculous Offer to Settle
We attended a mediation at the District Court earlier this week. Our clients have an excellent case, supported by an expert’s report, but they are concerned that the enemy company is going broke and any money that they get paid might be clawed back by a liquidator. Our clients are pragmatic. They offered to accept […]
Winding Up Estates
We’ve been helping a client wind up an estate. Unfortunately, she started without us, and distributed a lot of what should have been the residuary estate to the intended beneficiaries, including herself. However, it then turned out that the unallocated assets were insufficient to cover the liabilities of the estate. So a proportion of the […]
Red Cross Will Special
Yesterday Jarred and Irene spent half a day each interviewing clients as part of a fund raiser for the Red Cross. The clients paid the Red Cross $75.00. Jarred and Irene interviewed the clients and are now busy preparing the wills. Jarred sent me a couple at 9.30pm last night to settle! Michael Paterson & […]
Purchase of Financial Planning Business
We are helping a lady negotiate the purchase of 2 financial planning businesses at the moment. We’ve done a few of these over the years, so we were able to put these together reasonably quickly. One lady was a procrastinating a bit, so we suggested the following e-mail be sent: “Dear Ms X, I have […]
Documents for a Proposed Development and a Visit from Constable Care!
We are working on a set of documents for a proposed development: A trust deed making it clear that the trustees are purchasing the land on trust for the beneficiaries, one of whom will own one strata unit and the other the rest; The wording for the contract of sale; Loan agreement from the mother/mother-in-law […]
The Importance of Joint Tenancy
Our client’s recently ex-husband died. The house was in joint names, so it automatically went to her and did not form part of his estate. She was not living in the house at the time of his death, but her 27 year old mentally ill step son had been boarding with the husband. Her tenancy […]
Contractor Contract
We met with a new client this week. He is looking at buying a truck and a business to go with it. The business has him working as a contractor for a large international company. The contract was heavily stacked in favour of the company. He has lots of responsibilities. The company had few. The […]
BUYERS (NEEDING FINANCE) BEWARE!
On 15 June 2011, the Court of Appeal of the WA Supreme Court in Dodds -v- Kennedy [No 2] [2011] WASCA 131 made some rulings in relation to the clause 1 of the Standard REIWA/Law Society Contract for Sale of Land by Offer and Acceptance that may surprise many in the Real Estate, Banking, Mortgage […]
Copyright – International Enforcement
We received some interesting instructions this week from a photographer that was referred by an old client. One of his photographs, of a girl with her hands and feet on the ground, but bending over backwards, has been found on a billboard poster in New Zealand advertising flexible bus fares! He had not given any […]
Buying or Selling a Business?
This week we’ve been asked to give advice on a 50 page business sale agreement. The purchaser price is about $650,000, so it needs to be right. Our client has been waiting about 6 months for the seller to provide a sale agreement. We were given a PDF to review. We printed it and re-scanned […]