If You Contract for a $2 Million Watch, You Probably Want the Original Dial

A recent case out of the District of Arizona, Cavan v. Maron, No. CV-15-02586-PHX-PGR (behind paywall), concerns a deal for rare Patek Philippe watches. The plaintiff agreed to purchase two watches for almost $4 million, providing a down payment of almost $3 million. The defendant did not deliver the watches and, in fact, allegedly sold them to someone else, so the plaintiff demanded his down payment back. A watch broker negotiated between the two parties and they decided that, instead, the defendant would sell the plaintiff another rare Patek Philippe watch that was worth more than $2 million. 

The defendant gave the plaintiff the promised watch, and a few years later, when the plaintiff was considering selling the watch, he brought it to an auction house for valuation. The auction house raised questions that the watch’s dial had been replaced. A “world renowned watch expert” agreed and pronounced the new dial “inferior,” meaning that the watch was now worth significantly less than it would have been with its original dial. 

This lawsuit resulted. The defendant argued that the agreement between the parties never expressly required that the watch had to be sold with its original dial. The court doesn’t let the defendant off on that technicality, though. The court notes that it was plausible that the parties intended, when they negotiated to buy and sell a watch worth more than $2 million, that the watch would have all of its original parts, and that a disclosure to the contrary might have been necessary. 

This decision was just surviving a motion to dismiss. Stay tuned for more exciting developments in the luxury watch contract world.