Innominate terms

Question 1

Remedies for a condition

Answer 1

Rescind the contract and sue for damages or affirm the contract and sue for damages

Question 2

Warranty

Answer 2

Only allows for damages

Question 3

Innominate term

Answer 3

A term which is impossible to accurately classify as either a condition or a warranty. Only once it is breached can it be determined what remedies are available.

Question 4

Parties can expressly state that a term goes to the root of a contract and that a breach will frustrate the contract

Answer 4

Where this is not the case, the courts will consider whether the term goes to the root of the contract.

Question 5

Interpreting an innominate term

Answer 5

There is no way of deciding that question except by looking at
the contract in the light of the surrounding circumstances, and
then making up one’s mind whether the intention of the
parties, as gathered from the instrument itself, will best be
carried out by treating the promise as a warranty sounding
only in damages, or as a condition precedent by the failure to
perform which the other party is relieved of his liability.

Question 6

Innominate terms: Factors to consider

Answer 6

A breach of it will “cause the buyer no great loss and would certainly not deprive him of the whole commercial benefit of the
contract of sale.”