Earlier this year, an Illinois appeal court examined the equitable defense of laches in an earnest money dispute between two contracting parties and former friends. Derived from an archaic French word – laschesse – meaning “dilatory,” laches applies where a plaintiff sits on his legal rights to the point where it’s unfair to make a defendant mount …
Tag Archives: earnest money
Statute of Frauds Defeats Seller’s Countersuit for Damages After Property Sale Falls Through (IL 2d Dist.)
When a deal to sell two industrial buildings collapsed, the would-be buyer sued to recover his $10K earnest money deposit. The seller, thinking the buyer was to blame for the aborted contract, countersued for $300K – the difference between the sale price plaintiff was supposed to pay and for what the seller ultimately sold the …