Beauty and Stylish

The making of their agreement began with oral statement from Stylish who had demands regarding the new house, to provide curtains, blinds, and window coverings. Beauty explained to Stylish that all window coverings were provided in the contract like what Stylish wanted. Several weeks later, Stylish had agreed, and then leads to written contract signing. This is when the issue arose. Somehow Stylish signed the contract which content is contrary to what he originally demanded, different from their pre-contractual statement. That the contract price of the house excludes all window coverings, and is the responsibility of the purchaser.
Stylish was upset when he realized that blinds, curtains and other window coverings were not provided. They had a valid contract within their case, and the terms of contract are certainly not breached. Although somehow there is a misrepresentation in term of Stylish’ demand and the content of the contract. The question is whether the Stylish can get his contractual rights in relation to the window coverings. A contract can be defined as an agreement enforceable in law. This suggests that there are some agreements that are not enforceable in law.
Whether or not a contract is enforceable in law firstly depends on whether or not the following four statements are satisfied : there must be an offer, acceptance of that offer, consideration or document under seal or deed, and intention to create legal relations. If one of the mentioned elements is missing, there will not be a valid contract. Offer is an expression made by one party as an “offeror” and the person who accepts the offer as “offeree”. In another words, offer is willingness by an offeror to enter into a legally binding contract with offeree.

In this case, Beauty is an offeror who offered the contract, and Stylish is an offeree whom the offer is made for. Once the offer has been set, then the next step is whether the contract would be accepted or not, which is accepted by Stylish, by signing the written contract. By signing the contract, it is presumed that the parties, Beauty and Stylish intended the document to be bound with sufficient consideration and thus creating legal relations. With the four elements, this contract is valid, recognized, and enforceable by law. In another words, Stylish can invoke assistance of the court. All contracts contain terms.
Various statements whether oral or written, may be made in the course of negotiation. This is known as pre-contractual statements. But not all statements end up having the same legal effects. First, the statement made may be in a form of “puff”. Such puffs cannot be taken seriously. They are advertisement or promotional statement which is not intended to be binding. Next, statements can be a ”representation”. It may not be terms of contract, but could just be a statement that would be more than just sales talk. Although representation may be in writing, it is not as a whole part of the contract.
Finally, statements made could be term. Terms are statements that form a contract. Somehow terms and representations are so much alike. The difference between a representation and a term depends on the intention of the parties and the actual facts of the case. If the intention of the parties is clear, then the statements they make can be considered to be a term of the contract. Otherwise it is just a representation. In Ecay v Godfrey (1947), the seller sold the boat to the buyer at 750 pounds. However, the seller expressly gave the buyer the opportunity to survey the boat.
It was held that the suggestion by the buyer that the seller independently survey the boat to be a representation. In this case, although both Stylish and Beauty had a clear intention of how the new house should be done, but the problem is that when the contract was done, that the intention was somehow not fulfilled. The contract states that the price of the house excludes window coverings, and is responsibility of the purchaser. This statement is a representation because the statement was made orally but was not written in contract. So far the essential elements of a contract and types of terms in a contract have been considered.
However, even if a contract has all the essential elements and terms, it may be still declared as unenforceable if the vitiating factor is present. Vitiating factors are number of causes which may prevent a contract from being enforceable in law. The agreement may be vitiated to a void contract or voidable contract by causes of: mistake, misrepresentation, duress, undue influence, illegality. Void contract is treated as if there was no contract at all between the parties. Any belongings received from the agreement must be returned, any items that have been resold to another party, may be returned as well.
And any contract that violates public policy is considered as void. Voidable contract A “voidable” contract, on the other hand, is a valid contract and can be enforced. Usually only one party is bound to the contract terms in a voidable contract. The unbound party is allowed to cancel the contract, which makes the contract void. The main difference between the two is that a void contract cannot be performed under the law, while a voidable contract can still be performed, although the unbound party to the contract can choose to void it before the other party performs.