Contractual Terms in English Law - "Subject To" Contracts

"Subject To" Contracts

If a contract specifies "subject to contract", it may fall into one of three categories:

  1. The parties are immediately bound to the bargain, but they intend to restate the deal in a formalised contract that will not have a different effect; or
  2. The parties have completely agreed to the terms, but have made the execution of some terms in the contract conditional on the creation of a formalised contract; or
  3. It is merely an agreement to agree, and the deal will not be concluded until the formalised contract has been drawn up.

If a contract specifies "subject to finance", it imposes obligations on the purchaser:

  • The purchaser must seek finance; and
  • When offers of finance arrive, the purchaser must make a decision as to whether the offers of finance are suitable.

This may also refer to contingent conditions, which come under two categories: condition precedent and condition subsequent. Conditions precedent are conditions that have to be complied with before performance of a contract With conditions subsequent, parties have to perform until the condition is not met. Failure of a condition repudiates the contract this is not to necessarily discharge it. Repudiation will always gives rise to an action for damages.

Read more about this topic:  Contractual Terms In English Law

Famous quotes containing the words subject to, subject and/or contracts:

    “The idea of feminine authority is so deeply embedded in the human subconscious that even after all these centuries of father-right the young child instinctively regards the mother as the supreme authority. He looks upon the father as equal with himself, equally subject to the woman’s rule. Children have to be taught to love, honor, and respect the father.”
    —Elizabeth Gould Davis (b. 1910)

    “But the creative person is subject to a different, higher law than mere national law. Whoever has to create a work, whoever has to bring about a discovery or deed which will further the cause of all of humanity, no longer has his home in his native land but rather in his work.”
    —Stefan Zweig (18811942)

    “Bankers, nepotists, contracts and talkies: on four fingers one may count the leeches which have sucked a young and vigorous industry into paresis.”
    —Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)