Court Opinion

ID: 9848846
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:28:40.921369+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:18:49.709370
License: Public Domain

Deen, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
As noted by the majority opinion, OCGA § 11-9-504 (3) requires that the disposition of repossessed collateral be commercially reasonable. The purpose of the “reasonable notification” requirement of *209OCGA § 11-9-504 (3) is to afford a debtor the opportunity to protect his interests at the sale (by challenging aspects of the sale or seeking out potential buyers) or to redeem the collateral prior to any sale. Barbree v. Allis-Chalmers Corp., 250 Ga. 409 (297 SE2d 465) (1982); Geoghagan v. Commercial Credit Corp., 130 Ga. App. 828 (204 SE2d 784) (1974). Providing the debtor with reasonable notification of the intended disposition, in short, enhances the likelihood of a commercially reasonable disposition.
In the instant case, it appears that the actual “method, manner, time, place, and terms” of the disposition of the aircraft could hardly have been more commercially reasonable. See Farmers Bank, Union Point v. Hubbard, 247 Ga. 431 (276 SE2d 622) (1981). CFC solicited approximately 600 bids from dealers, brokers, and individuals, and eventually sold the airplane to the highest bidder for more than its estimated fair market value. To facilitate the matter, CFC also financed the sale. A debtor’s interest at a repossession sale obviously is that the collateral be sold for as much as possible, and that was done in the instant case.
I cannot subscribe to the conclusion of the majority opinion that the understatement of the balance due in the redemption notice rendered CFC’s repossession and sale of the airplane commercially unreasonable. The statute itself does not even require that a redemption notice declare the amount of indebtedness due. Compare Cook v. First Nat. Bank of Atlanta, 130 Ga. App. 587 (203 SE2d 870) (1974). This writer concurs with the implicit holding of the majority opinion that where a redemption notice nevertheless includes an inaccurate statement of the balance due and the inaccuracy misleads or prevents the debtor from exercising the right of redemption or otherwise protecting his interest, such a notice may render a sale commercially unreasonable; however, in the instant case there simply was no evidence that CFC’s inadvertent understatement of the balance due so misled DECI as to prevent it from exercising its right to redeem the aircraft or otherwise participate in the disposition of the collateral. Although DECI’s president did state that he had expected the proceeds of the sale of the airplane to approximate the balance claimed due in the redemption notice, he also admitted that he had had no interest in redeeming the aircraft even at that price because he considered it unfit and unmerchantable.
In summary, the understatement of the balance due in the redemption notice apparently did not cause DECI’s failure to take any action to protect its interest, and it affected neither the purpose of the notification requirement nor the commercial reasonableness of the sale of the aircraft. The contrary conclusion of the majority opinion “overcomes me” but “it does not convince me.” Doyal Dev. Co. v. Blair, 135 Ga. App. 337, 338 (217 SE2d 501) (1975). Accordingly, I *210respectfully dissent.
Decided September 4, 1985 —
Rehearing denied September 26, 1985 —
Paul M. Talmadge, Jr., Stephen E. O’Day, for appellant.
Charles A. Ratz, for appellee.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Birdsong and Judge Sognier join in this dissent. Judge Carley concurs in the judgment of the dissent only.