What if I don't want to buy back the chometz from the goy?

(he owes me 99,995 not 999,995)

I’m not sure why Joseph doesn’t just learn Gemora Pesachim and the Shulchan Aruch etc. I think he’s just trying to start a conversation. Everyone agrees that the whole mechiras chometz is a halachic trick. It is truly a ha’ar’oma. Bitul b’alma sagi – from a Torah perspective Bitul is sufficient. All the rest is d’Rabbonon. Don’t forget that we also rent the part of the house / business that the chometz is contained in.

“don’t the rabbonim doing the sale with the goy make the transaction legally binding under the local/national laws?”

Yes, and there is no question he halachicly owes me the money, and while I’m no lawyer I believe legally as well, exactly as you say.

My concern is twofold.
1) If lemaisah in such a situation I in all likelihood will not collect the money, doesnt that make the mechira appear to be a harama
Admittedly this is a far fetched scenario so it might not actually be a problem. And secondly maybe I’m wrong and a the Rav who facilitates the mechira would say absolutly go to beis din/court and get him to pay for HIS chometz that got destroyed. Somehow I doubt it,
2) Based on the above, it might be an issue of taking achriyus over his chometz given that there will be such a headache if it gets destoyed I’d be worried and perhaps even protective of his chometz.

Again, I’m not sure what would happen,

I guess my question is simply:
What do you think would happen after Pesach I want to get paid for the chometz I sold and that got destroyed. Do you think the Rav would tell me to go sue the goy for the money he owes me?

If you have 100.000 inventory I would hope you had insurance. Can you collect the insurance if something happens to the warehouse and you sold the inventory to the goy?

Joseph,
1. One does not sell the utensils themselves. If you do you have to tovel them again after Pesach as they belonged to a goy.
2. While a goy is obligated in the sheva mitzvot (and some say all of the mishpatim) there is a machloket if they are also obligated in monetary halachot or if they can make up what they want.
3. The status of the sale in secular law is not necessarily relevant. Someone snitched to the Austrian government that the Jews did not pay the tax on contracts. The Emperor said that it was not a real contract but just something the Jews do for religious reasons. Someone then suggested that the contract was invalid because of dina d’malchuta dina. the Chatam Sofer said that it was still valid.(the
Chavat Yair however did mention this as a problem).

I’m not going to address individual posts because there are too many of them, but if you structure the sale so that if the buyer doesn’t pay it reverts then retroactively you owned chometz on Pesach. That is not the way it should be done, and not the way I have seen it done.

The sale is a 100% sale, and ideally should be structured so that even if the buyer never pays the chometz is still his, and he can be sued for the money. That is the way every sale I’ve witnessed has been done. And no, there is no guarantee that we will buy it back, but we can give him an informal assurance that if he doesn’t find a buyer in the next week we will find him one.

In the case of individual householders, of course we want to buy our former chometz back, because it would be inconvenient to have to go shopping to replace it. But in the case of a business, on the contrary, we would be delighted if he decided to take it all and pay for it.

The reason we buy it back is very simple — if we don’t, then next year we will not be able to find a goy willing to buy it from us.

ubiq: There you go. Milhouse agrees with my underlying point.

Milhouse

To elaborate/ clarify, metaltalin are not acquired by kesef. If you go to a store, and but a loaf of bread on credit, it is yours 100%. Say it gets stolen from your car, it is your bread that was stolen bot the store owners you still owe him money.

If you default and never pay him, that diesnt change the fact that you still own it and owe him money (or the bread back).

Now usually a sale of bread is not structured in a way to allow giving the bread back. But mechiras chometz (like a mortgage on a house) is. The guy bought it it is 100% is completely no its and or buts.
After pesach je either pays what he owes, or gives HIS chometz back

NC

Your first statement : “He gives you a down payment and then you repossess it when he fails to pay the full amount after Pesach. ” was spot on.

I believe there is a typo in your second though “The concept of the goy saying “I’m keeping the chometz” is basically a fantasy dreamt up by people who don’t understand how it works.”

As you correctly point out i your first statement if the goy were to pay the full amount after PEsach he would get to keep the chometz.
The “fantasy dreamt up by people who don’t understand how it works. is the reverse “thinking of not buying the chometz back from the goy” which as you correctly point out is hogwash, as thee is no “buying back”

ubiquitin, I said I have not gone through the whole discussion, so I’m addressing general points, not necessarily what any one person has written.

“May I also suggest that those who treat it as a ha’rama, or as less than a 100% ”
No. People who have a minhag not to sell chometz gamor are not hashkafically opposed to machiras chometz. Even they don’t consider other peoples’ sold chometz gomur to be chometz sh’over alav pesach.

“There absolutely is a buying back. I’ve seen it myself.”
It seems like the process you’re describing is the same is what we’re saying. My only point is that I’m not a fan of the lashon “buying back.” The goy didn’t pay yet. It’s just semantics, but I think it leads to a lot of the mistakes people have made on this thread.

You made the rov a shliach to sell the chometz, and to buy it back after Pesach if it’s still available. If you don’t want to take possession of it you don’t have to, but you’re not getting any money.

Neville & Ubiquitin, first of all the repurchases I’ve seen absolutely were exactly that, the rov explicitly offered to buy the chometz and the goy agreed to sell, and they did all the kinyonim. But according to you, how is it that the goy walks away with a profit? How could he make a profit if he didn’t sell anything? If he is simply allowed to back out of the original purchase then he should be lucky to walk away without a loss? And yet he must make a profit, or else why would he agree to participate in this whole rigmarole in the first place?

This proves that what is happening is a genuine sale, followed by a genuine resale at a profit. The goy buys it in the first place, not for his own use but in the hope of flipping it at a profit. A week later he has not yet found a buyer, so we offer to be that buyer. That is all.