All sellers and buyers should understand both what constitutes a “defect” in a house for sale, and the extent and limits of a seller’s duty to disclose defects to prospective buyers.

A recent High Court award of damages, to a buyer who only became aware of substantial damp problems in the house after taking transfer, discusses the effect of a standard “voetstoots” clause on a buyer’s claim for redress. What did the buyer have to prove? How did the mandatory “property condition report” impact on the seller’s liability? We’ll look at how the Court addressed those questions …

As the “pothole plague” grows alarmingly both here and overseas, an increasing number of us are suffering pothole-related losses. 

We’ll discuss your right to claim for both vehicle damage and personal injury with reference to a recent High Court case which handed a resounding victory to a motorist suing a provincial road authority for R8.6m. He had crashed after hitting a pothole and although he had no personal memory of the accident, expert evidence was enough to persuade the Court that he should be awarded 100% or his proved or agreed damages.

It doesn’t seem logical that you might need to formally register as a “credit provider” in terms of the NCA (National Credit Act) before you can lend money to family or friends. But if you didn’t register when you should have, your loan could be unlawful and unclaimable. You could lose everything. You could even face penalties for non-compliance with the NCA.

A recent Supreme Court of Appeal decision turned on the question of whether a R15m loan to a friend, sealed with nothing more formal than a handshake, had been made “at arm’s length” or not. 

“Insolvency”, “Liquidation” or “Bankruptcy”?

Commonly confused, these terms are usually encountered in the context of debtors who are unable to pay their debts. An individual’s or trust’s estate is “sequestrated” and a “trustee” appointed to sell the insolvent estate’s assets and to distribute the proceeds according to legal principles. A similar (but not identical) process applies to corporate entities like companies, but in this case the entity is “liquidated” or “wound up”, with a “liquidator” being appointed. To complicate matters, the term “bankruptcy” is often used loosely in both of the above scenarios - but the good news is that only lawyers really need to know the difference!