Lemon Law for California

Lemon cars involve both safety- and non-safety-related issues. Problems related to safety include issues with:

    * Airbags
    * Steering and alignment
    * Transmission - sudden lack of acceleration, slipping, over-revving
    * Stalling or shutting off
    * Headlights
    * Brakes

Other times, the problem is not related to safety, such as a transmission noises, grinding and clunking; electrical problems with the radio, locks, windows or air conditioning; or cosmetic issues, such as defects in car molding. Contact us if you have experienced any of these problems during the warranty period of your vehicle.
The Law Protects You From Lemons

California Lemon Law and federal consumer warranty law protect people who buy or lease an automobile and experience problems during the warranty period. These laws offer the following remedies:

    * The manufacturer repurchases the car from you.
    * The manufacturer replaces your car.
    * You can receive a cash settlement, which may include repair supervised by the manufacturer’s representative.

Dealers and manufacturers will try to give you the runaround. They may try to blame outside causes or ask your insurance to cover the issue so that they do not have to pay you back.

Well, here’s a great answer I found online that describes it better than I could.
The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act is a Federal Law that protects the buyer of any product which costs more than $25 and comes with an express written warranty. This law applies to any product that you buy that does not perform as it should.

The Magnuson-Moss Act gives consumers considerable rights in dealing with manufacturers of lemon cars. A car buyer is guaranteed that certain minimum requirements of warranties must be met, and provides for disclosure of warranties before purchase.

Regarding “lemon cars“, this law greatly affects the rights of car buyers. For any product which has a written warranty if any part of the product, or the product itself is considered defective, the warrantor must permit the buyer the choice of either a refund or replacement of the product.

Law firms have argued successfully to juries that the lemon manufacturers should be given three attempts to fix the defect. Continued attempts to repair beyond the initial three should not be allowed. This is called the “three strikes and you’re out” principle.

A consumer may pursue legal action in any court of general jurisdiction in the United States to enforce his rights under the Magnuson-Moss Law. Attorney’s fees based on actual time spent will be covered if the consumer does prevail.

Due to this particular condition, there is quite a bit of financial pressure on the manufacturer to settle consumers disputes before going to court, as this would keep their expenses down.

When it comes to lemon laws, knowing the basics can literally make the difference between getting taken
advantage of or getting the chance to recover the money that you spent on the car. This section will help you get a good understanding of the basics behind the lemon laws. Keep in mind that this is just an overview and each of these laws varies by state.

The state lemon law statutes offer a wide array of relief for consumers who get stuck with a bad car or truck after they buy.
These statutes give buyers the chance to recover the costs and attorney fees which will pile up as you press the manufacturer to live up to the lemon laws. Of course this is a strong incentive for attorneys who would like to represent unhappy owners of lemon cars.

The easiest way to describe lemon laws is to say that they basically outline the procedures that are used in order to settle these sorts of problems.
Again, these lemon laws differ from one state to another, but in general, lemon laws are designed to provide the owner with a refund or replacement vehicle should this kind of problem occur.

For example, some states require a refund or a new car if a large enough problem can’t be repaired within four tries, or if the car has been out of service for around a month within the first year or 12,000 miles driven.
There are some exceptions to this rule, such as; some states only give manufacturers one chance to repair a significant safety related issue like the brakes or steering.

Some states don’t stop with providing lemon owners a refund or a new car. In fact, some of them will also let you recover any sort of attorney’s fees that build up while you pursue satisfaction from your purchase of a lemon.
Isn’t it good to know that you can get some sort of return on your money when you buy a lemon?

Every state in America now has a State Lemon Law that is built to protect consumers from dishonest and uncooperative dealerships. It allows the car buyer to exchange the defective vehicle for a new one or to have the manufacturer buy it back from them.

Once you’ve established that the manufacturer is going to buy back your car, the battle will switch over and become about the vehicle’s value. You want the per-mile charge to be as little as possible so that you can get the most for your money on the return.
So, now you’re ready to get into the actual lemon law complaint process. This is where it really gets fun. Can you hear the sarcasm there?

We know, you probably think this comes off as a sales page trying to get you to buy some kind of info-product and not a guide to recognizing a “lemon car” before you buy it. We purposely wrote that headline that way to get your attention.

Why, you ask? Well, because this is probably the most important thing we can teach you. After all, if you can learn to successfully avoid buying a lemon car in the first place you’ll be soooooo much better off. 
We’ll teach you how to successfully get out from under a “lemon car” if you do happen to end up with one. But, it’ll still be a big hassle that will cost you lots of time and cause pleanty of headaches before you’re done.

So, even though you can use your states automobile lemon laws to get some justice after the fact, it’s much better to just avoid the whole ordeal to start with. Agreed?
Ok, so with that in mind, here’s a checklist to help you tell if that shiny car you’re itching to buy is a “lemon” waiting to happen.

Check out this checklist before you buy your next car:
• Before you shop for a car, you should take the time to do enough research to know what you want. This is where it pays to do good research. You’ll often find out if the model of car your interested in has any well known defects or other known issues. There are lots of automobile review sites online that cater to consumers by giving alerts to these known issues. Start your research here.

• Don’t get too attached to a car before you buy it. It’s easy to let emotions sway your decisions, which could keep you from paying attention to the signs that are telling you the car you’re looking at could be a “lemon”.

• You should always buy used cars from lots that are connected to new car dealerships. They keep only the best trade-ins. Also, since they’re connected to large dealerships they may be a little easier to deal with if you happen to get a lemon vehicle.

• Don’t buy a used car from anyone without having it thoroughly checked out by an independent mechanic first. I know most people don’t like spending money on a car they don’t even own yet but look at it this way. The small amount you spend now can save you thousands of dollars and many months of headaches trying to fix the situation.
Besides, this should be the absolute last step before you sign on the dotted line. Make absolutely sure that everything else looks good before you take this last step. That way you’re not paying to have several cars checked out, and you’ll appreciate the peace of mind you’ll get from having a qualified mechanic tell you your new car isn’t gonna fall apart on you.

• The average yearly mileage that you should find on a used car is 15,000 miles. This is important for a couple reasons. First, most used cars start to break down once you pass 100,000 miles. Second, it gives you a good idea of how hard the previous owner drove the car. If it’s 2 years old and has 60,000 miles you can safely assume the previous owner drove it pretty hard, and the harder a car is driven the more wear and tear it’s parts get. Obviously, this will speed up any mechanical breakdowns.

• You’ll want to run the cars VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) to see if it’s been in any accidents or had any major repairs or recalls. The VIN number is what you’ll use to get all of the records for everything that has ever happened to that individual car. You should definately do this before you start buying a car whether it’s used or new. It could certainly save you a lot of time and money later.
If you follow this point by point system of buying it shouldn’t be too difficult to avoid getting stuck with most lemon cars.

Toyota has announced that it is buying back 1995-2000 Tacoma pickup trucks with badly rusted frames. The buy back program that covers 813,000 trucks may cost Toyota as much as 100 million dollars. In addition to the buy back offer, Toyota is also extending the warranty on those frames to 15 years with unlimited mileage.

If a truck qualifies for a buy back Toyota will will pay 1.5 times the suggested retail price for a vehicle in excellent condition as calculated by Kelley Blue Book.

Owners of badly rusted Toyota Tacoma pick up trucks are instructed to return to the selling dealer for a free inspection. Tacoma owners who paid to have a rusty frame repaired and still own the vehicle can ask for compensation by calling Toyota at (888) 270-9371.

We have represented many clients for rusted frames with their lemon cars. Should your vehicle or truck have rust and the manufacturer fails to repair the damage give us a call. In most cases we are able to get compensation due to the damage.