I humbly disagree, Bucky. If a vendor says "$500 obo", he's making an offer to
the world. You're right, the courts do look at the intention of the parties,
but I'd say that the prima facie intention of the vendor is to sell the item to
the person who makes the highest offer (maybe "bid" is a better term, since
"offer", as you seem to know, is a technical term in contract law).
If I say "$50, I accept your offer", then I've accepted the offer, and a
contract is made. If a time period isn't stipulated, then it would be an
implied term of the contract that it's open for a "reasonable time period", or
until withdrawn by the vendor - but it could only be withdrawn prior to the
offer being accepted by a purchaser.
As to what a "reasonable time period" might be, if the vendor and purchaser
can't agree on that, then the courts could determine it. They determine implied
clauses in contracts all the time.
As I said in my previous post, the real problem would be what one's remedy would
be in such a situation; obviously going to court over such a small amount would
be silly and expensive - not worth anyone's while.
But then, I'm not a contract lawyer, and I could be wrong!
regards,
frank
Bucky wrote:
> I would suggest the courts would look at an OBO offering as an invitation to
> treat, where the next step would be an offer on the part of the buyer, and
> an acceptance (or lack of it) on the part of the seller. The overriding
> consideration in contract law is that the court will look at the intention
> of the parties in a transaction. It's really unlikely they'd find a
> unilateral contract in such a situation.
>
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