Help being taken to small claims court.

[FBIsMostWanted]

I inherited a flat from my great aunt and have just sold it. The FTB that bought it wanted most of the furniture and as I already have a house and don’t need it I agreed to leave most things. Most of the furniture is 15 plus years old but my aunt had amazing taste and didn’t stint on quality.
One of the things left was a sofa bed, probably @10 years old and I’ve never used it.
The FTB are now requesting £1500 as the sofa bed mechanism doesn’t work so won’t pull out. They are pissed!
At first they text me wanting money and when I said that the sofa wasn’t integral and wasn’t paid for so I wasn’t going to buy them a new sofa they have gone to the small claims court.
I have spoken with my solicitor and he said that they never asked for the condition of the sofa and didn’t pay money for the sofa so they don’t have a leg to stand in but do they? Would the courts side with them?
I have no receipts for the furniture and didn’t even know about the bed not working.
Anyone experienced anything like this?

WTF was the solicitor doing advising them that? Did they misunderstand and think money had been exchanged for the sofa? Did they not realise it was free? I can't believe a legally trained professional would advise that. I'm imagining the judge will say the same thing! Batshit!

Have they disclosed the legal advice they received? Private correspondence between themselves and their solicitor? That's privileged so definitely no need to disclose and very odd they have done, presumably they just don't know that.

Either way, presumably their solicitor was saying that was their only option (true) rather than they had a chance in hell of being successful (which they don't)

I doubt it was advice, as such - probably just the solicitor brushing them off by shrugging and saying something along the lines of, 'Nothing we can do. You could try small claims if you want...'
Reading between the lines, I'd say their conveyancing solicitor was thoroughly fed up with them!

Op I’m invested in your story now. Will be thinking of you on 14th. How stressful for you! No good deed goes unpunished and I hope you can claim your costs back off them!

completely not relevant, but when we bought our house (in USA) over 10 years ago, there was some furniture in it that the seller asked if we wanted as he’d already moved out of state and he just wanted rid. he was fairly recently widowed and so nice. I’m not sure if there’s an actual legal reason, but we had to pay for it to him personally on signing, it wasn’t part of the house purchase. We paid him $20 for a huge sofa, a desk, bedside tables etc. We only got rid of the sofa when we moved house and we still have the desk and bedside tables going strong in DS room. Best $20 I ever spent!

@Shroedy and @Echobowels yes their solicitors letter read very much as a “nothing can be done about this but if you’re mad enough take it to small claims and crack on without us!”
They even included our solicitors response which was the sofas were not purchased and you could have had them inspected but you didn’t, so piss off! I’m paraphrasing but you get the jist!

Hopefully 11 days time and it’ll be over.

Im sure you know but make sure you write down your timeline and take copies of any relevant correspondence with you. Also the valuation from the estate agents and anything showing any other interest in the house to support your statement that you'd not have reduced the price if they had not wanted the sofa.
They are likely to have wound themselves up into a frenzy about this so you can been cool, calm, collected and reasonable and they will look batshit. Just try not to be goaded by them
Good luck OP!

I'm a litigation lawyer. Please don't worry because on the basis of the information you've given, the judge on 14 Feb is going to be very irritated by this baseless claim wasting her or his time.

How much was the removal?

I can't wait to hear what the judge says.

Mine said to the man who tried to sue me over a stained tablecloth

"Sorry. But you can't just randomly decide to sue a member of the public without any grounds."

They have said removal was £150!

I’m hoping they will get laughed out too.

This is utterly crazy. What a complete waste of time.

Surely the local council would have picked it up for about £25 max? Mine does it for free.

@Agapornis I think our LA charge a bit more than that but definitely not £150.
OP might be an idea to look up Local Authority charge for collection of a sofa just so you can prove they were stupid to pay £150 - if indeed they ever did!

But LA only do kerbside pick up so may require assistance to remove from property.

How are you feeling OP
Thinking of you this week. You will be so relieved when this is done

Thank you @HeadacheEarthquake only 2 more days to go. Nervous but I know I’m in the right. It’s crazy that anyone can pay to take someone to court.

@FBIsMostWanted I'm sure you could get a Mumsnet posse to come and support you.

Best of luck!

When I spoke to the team at MCOL they told me most claims are over a few quid loaned between mates, someone owing someone else a cigarette, or not paying for their share of a trip.

Good luck on Friday OP!

Best of luck OP

In fairness that’s the way it should be. You can’t pick and choose who should be able to as the whole point is that someone independent resolves a problem.
Doesn’t make it any nice for you in this case though. You’ll be fine don’t worry.

Good luck tomorrow. As someone who has been taken to the small claims court because I refused to pay a neighbour's £1k insurance excess (he lost as there was no evidence I had done anything negligent) it was a bit nerve racking to be in front of a judge as the defendant. But once we got into the case I concentrated on concisely answering the judge's questions and rebutting each allegation made by my neighbour with facts.

The feeling of elation after I won was unreal. Think you are going to feel the same at the end of the case tomorrow. Enjoy!

Hope it goes well tomorrow!