Takla v Nasr

In *Takla v Nasr*, the appellant, Ms Takla, appealed a decision concerning allegations of professional negligence against the respondent, a solicitor. Ms Takla had retained the respondent to act on her purchase of a townhouse, paying 80 per cent of the purchase price as a deposit. Before completion, the vendor company went into receivership, and Ms Takla lost her deposit. The directors of the vendor company had agreed to guarantee the deposit, but they did not execute the contract containing this guarantee.

The central legal issues before the court were whether the respondent solicitor had breached their duty of care to Ms Takla. Specifically, the court considered whether the respondent failed to adequately warn Ms Takla of the risks involved in the transaction, and whether they breached their duty by failing to procure the guarantees from the vendor's directors and investigate their financial standing. A further issue was whether any alleged act or omission by the respondent caused Ms Takla's loss.

The Court of Appeal, comprising McColl, Basten and Hoeben JJA, dismissed the appeal. The court's reasoning, though not detailed in the provided text, would have involved an assessment of the solicitor's conduct against the standard of care expected of a reasonably competent solicitor in similar circumstances. This would include evaluating whether the respondent provided sufficient warnings about the risks associated with the deposit and the vendor's financial stability, and whether their actions or inactions directly led to Ms Takla's inability to recover her deposit. The court found that the respondent had not breached their duty of care in a manner that caused the appellant's loss.

The appeal was dismissed with costs.