Hire and purchase agreement
(gcide) | Hire purchase \Hire purchase\, or, more fully, Hire purchase
agreement \Hire purchase agreement\, or Hire and purchase
agreement \Hire and purchase agreement\ (Law)
A contract (more fully called contract of hire with an option
of purchase) in which a person hires goods for a specified
period and at a fixed rent, with the added condition that if
he shall retain the goods for the full period and pay all the
installments of rent as they become due the contract shall
determine and the title vest absolutely in him, and that if
he chooses he may at any time during the term surrender the
goods and be quit of any liability for future installments
upon the contract. In the United States such a contract is
generally treated as a conditional sale, and the term hire
purchase is also sometimes applied to a contract in which the
hirer is not free to avoid future liability by surrender of
the goods. In England, however, if the hirer does not have
this right the contract is a sale.
[Webster 1913 Suppl.] |