Sold as seen: what it actually covers in a private car sale in Ireland

"Sold as seen" works in Ireland for quality, and for nothing else. Section 14(1) of the Sale of Goods Act 1893 provides that, subject to the Act, there is no implied condition or warranty as to the quality or fitness for any particular purpose of goods supplied under a contract of sale. The merchantable quality condition in section 14(2) and the fitness condition in section 14(4) arise only where the seller sells in the course of a business. A genuine private seller is outside both.

Two other conditions cannot be excluded by any wording at all.

One: the right to sell

Section 12(1)(a) implies, in every contract of sale, a condition that the seller has a right to sell the goods. Section 12(1)(b) implies a warranty that the goods are free of any undisclosed charge or encumbrance and that the buyer will enjoy quiet possession.

Section 55(3) then provides that any term of that or any other contract exempting from all or any of the provisions of section 12 shall be void. Not "unenforceable unless reasonable" — void, in every contract, consumer or not.

So "sold as seen, no warranty given or implied" has never covered a car with outstanding hire purchase on it, or a stolen car. The buyer whose car is repossessed by the finance company recovers the full price from the seller as a total failure of consideration.

Two: the danger condition

This is the one private sellers do not know about.

Section 13(2) of the Sale of Goods and Supply of Services Act 1980: without prejudice to any other condition or warranty, in every contract for the sale of a motor vehicle (except a contract in which the buyer is a person whose business it is to deal in motor vehicles) there is an implied condition that at the time of delivery of the vehicle under the contract it is free from any defect which would render it a danger to the public, including persons travelling in the vehicle.

Every contract. Not every trade sale. The only carve-out is where the buyer is a motor dealer.

Section 13(9) provides that, notwithstanding section 55(1) of the 1893 Act, any term of a contract exempting from all or any of the provisions of this section shall be void. So no disclosure clause, no "sold as seen", and no acknowledgement signed by the buyer removes it.

Section 13(7) extends the right to sue to a person who uses the vehicle with the buyer's consent and suffers loss as a result of a breach — a family member, typically — and section 13(8) gives that person two years from the accrual of the cause of action.

Section 13(5) adds an evidential sting: where an action is brought for breach of the section 13(2) condition by reason of a specific defect, and no certificate complying with the section has been given, it is presumed unless the contrary is proved that the defect existed at the time of delivery.

The only lawful way to sell a car that is not fit to drive

Section 13(3). Subsection (2) does not apply where all three of the following hold:

• (a) it is agreed between the seller and the buyer that the vehicle is not intended for use in the condition in which it is to be delivered; and
• (b) a document consisting of a statement to that effect is signed by or on behalf of the seller and the buyer and given to the buyer prior to or at the time of delivery; and
• (c) it is shown that the agreement is fair and reasonable.

The third limb is not in the seller's gift. "Fair and reasonable" is judged under the Schedule to the 1980 Act by reference to the circumstances which were, or ought reasonably to have been, known to or in the contemplation of the parties when the contract was made. Selling a car that is plainly being bought to drive away, and describing it on paper as not for road use, fails that limb — and the condition then applies as though the statement had never been signed.

Where the vehicle genuinely is going for parts, repair or export, the statement is straightforward and worth having. It must be signed by both and given to the buyer at or before delivery, not posted afterwards.

Description binds a private seller too

Section 13 of the 1893 Act — a different section 13, in a different Act — implies a condition in a sale by description that the goods correspond with the description. It applies to a private seller exactly as it applies to a dealer.

The year, the model, the mileage, "full service history" and "never crashed" are the description. If you cannot stand over the odometer reading, say so in the document: it stops the reading being a description you are bound by. What it does not do is license a statement you know to be untrue — knowingly selling on a false reading is a criminal matter as well as a civil one, and the buyer has a claim in deceit regardless of anything in the paperwork.

Section 14(2)(a) of the 1893 Act is the private seller's friend on the other side: even where the merchantable quality condition applies, it does not extend to defects specifically drawn to the buyer's attention before the contract is made. Disclosure is protection. Write the faults down.

If you are selling in the course of a business, none of this applies

A trader selling to a consumer is governed by Part 2 of the Consumer Rights Act 2022, with its own conformity requirements, hierarchy of remedies and thirty-day short-term right to end the contract. Section 13(4) of the 1980 Act separately requires a person whose business it is to deal in motor vehicles to give the buyer a prescribed written certificate that the vehicle is free from any defect rendering it a danger. And section 11 of that Act makes it a criminal offence for a person in the course of a business to furnish a document containing a statement that restricts the buyer's rights under sections 12 to 15 of the 1893 Act, or to display or publish one.

What to write instead of "sold as seen"

Three paragraphs, and they are stronger than the phrase:

1. A record that the seller does not sell in the course of a business, so section 14(1) applies and no condition or warranty as to quality or fitness arises.
2. A list of the faults, so that section 14(2)(a) does its work and the buyer cannot say they were not told.
3. An express statement that nothing in the document excludes or restricts section 12 of the 1893 Act or section 13 of the 1980 Act — because it cannot, and saying so makes the rest of the document look like what it is.

Our vehicle bill of sale does exactly that, and produces the section 13(3) statement where the vehicle really is being sold for parts or repair. For the registration side, see the bill of sale does not change the owner.