Comment by mdorazio
Not sure if your car example was meant to be general or specific, but Lemon Laws are extremely common across the states and are very easy to take advantage of without needing to retain a lawyer. For example, in Texas you fill out a form, pay a $35 filing fee, then bring your evidence to mediation.
It's a bit of both. Generally the idea holds. The example isn't that bad either. O(100k-1M) people have dealer-fraud related problems every year in the US, usually without happy outcomes. A few ways this might happen relating to my use of the word "lemon" include:
1. Colloquial use of "lemon" differs from the legal definition. In the given example, this might include a 15yr old vehicle (far outside any normal "manufacturer's" warranty) with numerous defects both known to the dealer and lied about to the consumer. The dealer would likely lose any civil complaint, but in Texas, and most states, this doesn't count as a "lemon." You're protected, if at all, by the fact that the salesperson warranted a thing, and perhaps any actual written "warranty" (really insurance, not that it necessarily matters) the dealer might have sold you. You usually waive the warrant of merchantability, so the fact that the car is a dud isn't enough by itself for you to have any damages (all state-specific, consult a lawyer in your jurisdiction).
2. Picking on Texas, since you brought it up, if you only bring the car in 3 times for a major defect covered under the lemon law, it's not a lemon yet. If the dealer refuses to deal with you on the 3rd instance then you'll have to sue with some other justification.
3. In the vast majority of states, you don't have an automated (minus filing fees) hearing process pertaining to lemons. Even in those which do, you're much more likely to succeed with the help of an attorney. In either case, in most states, attorney's fees are not part of the damages you can claim, and when squabbling about a $5k used car it can easily cost more in attorney fees (plus incidentals like renting a car and missing work for the actual hearings -- usually not covered even in states granting damages for incidentals (including rentals and missing work in other contexts) arising from the lemon), often making it not even worth pursuing.
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Usually, even with moderate legal protections, you don't want to enter into an agreement where you expect to have to rely on those protections. Your best-case scenario is that you waste a bunch of time and still have only as many resources as you started with. You'll usually do even worse. Why take a losing gamble?