It occurred to me that maybe not all of you know that an agreement made by email, texting or fax is just as enforceable as one made in writing.
It’s quite true and this has been enacted into law in nearly every state as the “Uniform Electronic Transactions Act” (UETA…Wikepedia has good article on it) making any agreement made by email, texting or fax just as enforceable as one made in writing.
There’s a group of proposed laws that have been written by the Uniform Laws Conference which is made up of lawyers and law professors who meet at regular times to develop laws that they recommend be adopted by all States and many States have in fact adopted many of these Uniform Acts.
I encourage all of you to look up those various rules and laws that have been adopted by various state legislatures and in particular have a look at the UETA law that has by now been adopted in whole or large part by nearly every State.
In fact I was amazed when I found that this particular Uniform Act has made the rounds and been adopted by the various States in such a few years…while most of the UAs have been kicking around for lots of years.
Now let’s talk about how this UA might be of considerable benefit to the REI.
If you make a deal by email on any property, whether to buy or sell, and the other guy agrees to your deal by email, texting or fax, and your resulting correspondence contains a complete contract (offer,acceptance and consideration) that is enough to force him/her to do whatever was agreed upon and can be court-enforced.
Some time ago an “almost” owner of a property in another state told me if I’d help him in clearing title to a property by finding its lost title holder, the person I was talking to would give me X% of that property.
Later he tried to renege (after I’d found the missing owner) but meanwhile I’d built a note-book filled with emails concerning our agreement and when his lawyer learned I’d built such a strong case he had his client perform on that agreement.
So you should just remember that whatever deals you make by email, texting or faxes are just as enforceable as if made by paper & pen or typewriter and signed.