Well, after 30 years in the legal field, I can pretty comfortably disagree with you.
I agree with your points on what would result in a judgment in court. If the dependent claimed fraud, which he has said in this thread, he would need to PROVE the fraud. Just saying that he thinks the dealer intentionally misrepresented the tractor doesn't prove anything. The damages would be quite easy to prove at some level. The plaintiff doesn't need to prove the absolute maximum loss unless that is what they were asking for. If they had customers look at a tractor and then change their mind due to hearing about the "fraud", that would be easily provable damages. A few people doing that could raise the damages quite quickly. Then you have the fact that many jurisdictions don't require exact damages to file. In our court system, all you have to do is file for damages under $25k or over 25k. You could later specify that you were asking for 10 million but to get the ball rolling, you check one of the 2 boxes I mentioned above.
If there is proof that the dealer committed a fraud that us one thing and, you would be correct. If the dealer listed the hours displayed, THAT isn't fraudulent unless he knew abd it could be proven that he knew it was inaccurate.
If I'm not mistaken, he posted the listing for the tractor which would list the seller.
Finally, I started reading the post from page one and I am commenting on the posts as I come to them. I don't know the final outcome.
Care to point out anything I said that was inaccurate in this comment?