New York used car lemon law

New York has two lemon laws. The new-car law (General Business Law §198-a) runs against the manufacturer; the used car lemon law (GBL §198-b) runs against the dealer who sold or leased you the car — and it requires that dealer to hand you a written warranty with the sale. This page is the used law on its own. For the new-car law, see the New York filing guide. Last reviewed: October 2026.

Who and what is covered

Section 198-b covers a “used motor vehicle” — one that was purchased, leased, or transferred after 18,000 miles of operation or two years from the date of original delivery, whichever came first. The buyer must be a “consumer”: someone who buys or leases other than for resale, primarily for personal, family, or household purposes. (A spouse or child who receives the vehicle or lease during the warranty, and anyone the warranty terms entitle to enforce it, also counts as a consumer.) Under the statute and the Attorney General’s fact sheet, all of the following must hold:

• You bought or leased from a New York dealer — a person or business that sells or leases three or more used vehicles in the previous 12 months. Private sales are not covered.
• The price — or, for a lease, the agreed value — was $1,500 or more.
• The vehicle had no more than 100,000 miles at the time of sale or lease. The section does not apply to a vehicle over 100,000 miles if that mileage was indicated in writing at the time of sale or lease.
• The vehicle is used primarily for personal, family, or household purposes.

Motor homes and off-road vehicles are excluded from §198-b, as are historical motor vehicles. The statutory definition of “dealer” also leaves out, among others, a bank or financial institution (except when it leases a used vehicle), a business selling a vehicle to its own employee, and the state and its subdivisions.

There is no lawful “as is” route around this law for a dealer sale: any agreement that waives, limits, or disclaims your §198-b rights is void, and if a dealer fails to give the written warranty the law requires, the dealer is deemed to have given it as a matter of law. Section 198-b also does not limit any rights or remedies you may have under other law.

The dealer’s written warranty

No dealer may sell or lease a used motor vehicle to a consumer without giving a written warranty that meets at least these minimum terms, which are set by the vehicle’s mileage and run from delivery:

The warranty must be delivered to you at or before you sign the sales or lease contract, together with the statutory notice described in the section — and at the time of purchase or lease the dealer must also give you the “Used Car Lemon Law Bill of Rights” notice. The warranty is provided at no extra charge beyond the price of the vehicle, and the Attorney General states that under it the dealer must repair any defect in covered parts with no cost to you.

Covered parts

The warranty covers at least these parts:

• Engine: all lubricated parts, water pump, fuel pump, manifolds, engine block, cylinder head, rotary engine housings, flywheel.
• Transmission: case, internal parts, torque converter.
• Drive axle: front and rear housings and internal parts, axle shafts, propeller shafts, universal joints.
• Brakes: master cylinder, vacuum assist booster, wheel cylinders, hydraulic lines and fittings, disc brake calipers.
• Radiator.
• Steering: steering gear housing and all internal parts, power steering pump, valve body, piston and rack.
• Alternator, generator, starter, and ignition system (excluding the battery).

For a failure of a covered part, the dealer or its agent must repair it — or, at the dealer’s election, reimburse you for the reasonable cost of repairing it. The dealer must still make that repair or reimbursement even if the warranty period has expired, provided you notify the dealer of the failure within the warranty period. That makes in-warranty notice the step that preserves everything else.

The warranty term is extended by any time the vehicle is in the dealer’s (or its authorized agent’s) possession for warranty repair; the term and the 15-day out-of-service count are also extended while repair services are unavailable because of war, invasion, strike, fire, flood, or other natural disaster. The written warranty may lawfully exclude failures caused by, among other things: lack of customary maintenance; collision, abuse, negligence, theft, vandalism, fire or other casualty, and environmental damage; a stopped or altered odometer, or an altered covered part that caused the failure; a motor tuneup; racing or other competition; towing a trailer the vehicle is not equipped by the manufacturer to tow; carrying passengers for hire; renting the vehicle to someone else; and valve or ring repair for low compression or oil consumption considered normal wear.

The used-car tests

The refund and replacement remedies below arise when the dealer fails to correct a malfunction or defect as required by the warranty — a failure of a covered part — which substantially impairs the value of the vehicle to you, after a reasonable period of time. Both elements are part of the statute: a defect outside the covered parts, or one that does not substantially impair value, does not build this claim, and it is an affirmative defense for the dealer that the defect does not substantially impair value, or that it results from abuse, neglect, or unreasonable modifications or alterations.

The law presumes the dealer has had a reasonable opportunity to correct the defect if either is true within the warranty period:

• the same malfunction or defect has been subject to repair three or more times by the selling or leasing dealer or its agent, and it continues to exist; or
• the vehicle is out of service by reason of repair, malfunction, or defect for a cumulative total of 15 or more days.

One counting rule matters: days when the dealer cannot complete the repair because necessary parts are unavailable do not count toward the 15 days (the dealer must exercise due diligence to obtain the parts). But there is a backstop — if the vehicle has been out of service a cumulative total of 45 days, you are entitled to the refund or replacement remedies even if part of that time was parts delay.

The refund and replacement

When the tests are met, the dealer must accept return of the vehicle and refund the full purchase price — for a lease, all payments made under the contract — including sales or compensating use tax, and, for a lease, cancel all further payments due. Only two deductions are allowed:

• a reasonable allowance for damage not attributable to normal wear or usage; and
• an adjustment for modifications that either increase or decrease the market value of the vehicle (or of the lease contract).

That is the complete list — §198-b has no deduction for miles driven, unlike the new-car law. If you traded in a vehicle, the purchase price is computed as the actual cash difference you paid, plus — if the dealer elects not to return your trade-in — the trade-in’s wholesale value as listed in the National Auto Dealers Association Used Car Guide (or another guide specified in DMV regulations), adjusted for mileage, improvements, and major physical or mechanical defects the trade-in had at trade-in time; the dealer must give you a written notice conspicuously explaining that method. Refunds are made to you and any lienholder as your interests appear on DMV ownership records; if the refund will not fully discharge a lien, the dealer must notify you by registered or certified mail, and you then have 30 days to pay the lienholder the shortfall — the notice must warn that failing to pay within 30 days terminates the dealer’s refund obligation.

Replacement is the dealer’s offer, not your choice: the dealer may elect to offer a comparably priced vehicle, with a price adjustment you both agree to. You are not obligated to accept a replacement — you may instead elect the refund.

The process: dealer, arbitration, court

Step 1 — Notify the dealer inside the warranty period

Report a covered part’s failure to the dealer within the warranty period and request the repair. As above, in-warranty notice preserves the dealer’s repair or reimbursement duty even if the warranty then expires. If a dealer refuses to honor your rights, the statute’s Bill of Rights directs you to complain to the New York Attorney General (Lemon Law Unit, 28 Liberty Street, New York, NY 10005; helpline 1-800-771-7755).

Step 2 — The dealer’s own dispute procedure, if it has one

If the dealer has established or participates in an informal dispute settlement procedure that complies in all respects with 16 CFR Part 703, the section’s refund and replacement provisions do not apply to a consumer who has not first resorted to that procedure. In that procedure, the dealer must ensure its arbitrators are familiar with §198-b and give arbitrators and consumers the statutory “Used Car Lemon Law Bill of Rights.” The dealer has up to 30 days from your notice that you accept the arbitrator’s decision to comply with it. Using an informal dispute procedure never cuts off your other legal remedies.

Step 3 — Attorney General arbitration (form CNS 007)

On payment of a prescribed filing fee, you may submit any §198-b dispute to the alternate arbitration mechanism established under Attorney General regulations — and on your application and fee payment, the dealer shall submit to it. In practice:

• Send the Used Car Request for Arbitration form (CNS 007) to the Attorney General’s Lemon Law Arbitration Unit — by email to [email protected] or by mail to 28 Liberty Street, 15th Floor, New York, NY 10005.
• Do not send the filing fee or supporting documents with the form. The Attorney General’s office reviews it and tells you whether the claim is accepted; if accepted, the form goes to the New York State Dispute Resolution Association (NYSDRA), the program administrator, which then asks you for the $120 filing fee and your documents. NYSDRA has administered the program for the Attorney General since November 1996 and assigns a local Community Dispute Resolution Center to each case.
• NYSDRA describes the program timing in typical terms: after acceptance you have 60 calendar days to pay the filing fee or the case is marked closed; the hearing is typically scheduled about 45 calendar days after the fee is paid; and in most cases the arbitrator renders an award within 5 calendar days after the hearing.
• The arbitration is conducted by a professional arbitrator or arbitration firm appointed under the Attorney General’s regulations, and is otherwise governed by CPLR Article 75. The arbitrator’s decision is binding on both parties, subject to a limited right of appeal to court by either party.
• If you win, the $120 filing fee is returned as part of the award.

NYSDRA also states that a used motorcycle claim is filed on the used-car form. (The official materials do not state a consistent motorcycle-specific fee, so this page gives none.)

Step 4 — After the decision

The dealer has 30 days from the mailing of a copy of the arbitrator’s decision to comply. A dealer that fails to comply within that period owes you $25 for each business day beyond 30 days, up to $500, on top of any other recovery — unless the delay is attributable to your request for a particular replacement or to conduct making compliance impossible. And if a dealer deliberately fails to pay an arbitration award that has not been stayed or appealed for 60 days after a copy was mailed to it, the DMV commissioner may deny, suspend, revoke, or refuse to renew the dealer’s registration.

Step 5 — Court

An action under §198-b must be commenced within four years of the date of original delivery of the used motor vehicle to the consumer — note that this clock runs from delivery of the used vehicle to you, not from the vehicle’s first-ever delivery. In an action to enforce the section, the court may award reasonable attorney’s fees to a prevailing consumer. Section 198-b itself sets no deadline for requesting Attorney General arbitration; the dated clocks are the warranty period (for notice, repairs, and days) and the four-year period for an action.

The overlap with the new-car law

The two statutes divide at the same line, from opposite sides: a vehicle bought, leased, or transferred within 18,000 miles or two years of original delivery (whichever came first) falls under the new-car law, §198-a; past that line it is a “used motor vehicle” under §198-b — which is why the Attorney General’s new-car fact sheet says that law “covers new cars and many used cars,” and why the Bill of Rights the dealer hands you says: “If your used car has 18,000 miles or less, you may be protected by the new car lemon law.” The regimes differ in ways that matter, and their numbers must not be blended:

• Defendant and warranty: §198-a runs against the manufacturer under the manufacturer’s warranty; §198-b runs against the dealer under the dealer’s mandatory written warranty above. The manufacturer owes nothing under §198-b.
• Tests: §198-a presumes a reasonable number of attempts at 4 repairs or 30 days out of service; §198-b uses 3 repairs or 15 days, inside a 30-to-90-day dealer warranty.
• Refund math: §198-a refunds are reduced by an allowance for mileage over 12,000 miles; the §198-b refund has no mileage deduction (see the refund section).
• Arbitration: new-car claims use form CFB007 and a $250 filing fee; used-car claims use form CNS 007 and a $120 fee. Both are Attorney General programs administered by NYSDRA.
• Motor homes: covered under §198-a, expressly excluded from §198-b — a used motor home has no §198-b claim.

Which law fits a given purchase is a facts question worth care before you file anything. The New York new-car filing guide walks through the §198-a route.

What to do, step by step

1. Pull the sale paperwork: the dealer’s written warranty and Bill of Rights notice, the sale or lease date, your delivery date, and the odometer reading at sale. Confirm which warranty tier you are in (90, 60, or 30 days) and when it ends — remembering the term extends while the vehicle sits with the dealer for warranty repair.
2. Report any covered-part failure to the dealer within the warranty period, and keep dated proof — that notice preserves the repair duty even past expiry.
3. Log every repair visit (use the free repair log): dates in and out, the part that failed, what was attempted, and whether the same defect persists. The 3-attempt and 15-day tests are counted from these records, inside the warranty period.
4. If a test is met and the dealer will not resolve it, check whether the dealer has a Part 703 dispute procedure — if it does, the refund provisions require resorting to it first. Otherwise, or after it, file the Attorney General’s Used Car Request for Arbitration (form CNS 007) — send no money until NYSDRA asks for the $120 fee.
5. Keep the four-year court clock in view: an action must be commenced within four years of the used vehicle’s delivery to you, and a court may award a prevailing consumer reasonable attorney’s fees — one reason to have a New York attorney review a strong case.

Primary sources: General Business Law §198-b, official text at nysenate.gov; New York Attorney General, Used-car lemon law: fact sheet; Attorney General, Used Car Lemon Law Request for Arbitration (form CNS 007); NYSDRA, Lemon Law Arbitration Program. Accessed October 19, 2026.