On July 29, 2025, Justice Cohen of the New York County Commercial Division issued a decision in Ader v. Ader, 2025 NY Slip Op. 33045(U), holding that a defendant’s lack of funds was an insufficient basis for a duress affirmative defense to a breach of contract claim, explaining:
Defendants argue that Jason entered the March 2020 Agreement under economic duress because, without his father’s personal guarantee, he risked losing the refinancing needed to avoid foreclosure on the Property. Defendants rely on Austin Instrument, Inc. v Loral Corp. (29 NY2d 124 [1971]) for the proposition that an agreement is voidable for economic duress if a party is—as Defendants quote the court—threatened with financial ruin. First of all, as Plaintiff points out, that quoted language appears nowhere in Austin Instrument. Instead, that case holds that a contract is voidable on the ground of duress if the party making the claim was forced to agree to it by means of a wrongful threat precluding the exercise of free will. Richard seeking assurances that he would be made whole if Jason defaulted on his obligations to BofA is not a wrongful threat, and the fact that Jason was otherwise in a difficult financial position is insufficient to establish duress.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).