CDJ’s #6 Topic of the Year: Does Colorado Need Construction Defect Legislation to Spur Affordable Home Development?
December 31, 2014 —
Beverley BevenFlorez-CDJ STAFFThe question involves whether a Colorado law passed in 2005 has made it too easy for homeowners to sue developers for construction defects, allegedly causing a decline in condominium building in the state. The Construction Defect Journal became a forum for this lively debate with two prominent, Colorado, construction defect attorneys providing their views on the subject:
Jesse Howard Witt, of the Witt Law Firm, published “Colorado Mayors Should Not Sacrifice Homeowners to Lure Condo Developers.”
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In response, James M. Mulligan of Snell & Wilmer, LLP presented his perspective in, “Are Construction Defect Laws Inhibiting the Development of Attached Ownership Housing in Colorado?”
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The city of Lakewood did not wait for the state, but instead passed its own ordinance, which “gives developers and builders a ‘right to repair’ defects before facing litigation and would require condominium association boards to get consent from a majority of homeowners — rather than just the majority of the board — before filing suit,” according to John Aguilar’s piece in The Denver Post.
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KB Homes Sues Condo Buyers over Alleged Cybersquatting and Hacking
October 22, 2013 —
CDJ STAFFWillowbrook, a condominium complex in Lakewood Ranch, Florida has had problems with water intrusion. Now the builder is having problems with some of the residents. National home builder KB Homes is alleging that a pair of Willowbrook home owners who created a web site about their problems have violated federal cybersquatting laws, as the web site names they have registered are close to that KB Homes. The suit alleges that Andrew Smith and Daniel Koehler hope to either get KB Homes to purchase the web site or to buy back their homes.
The lawsuit also alleges that three other individuals, William Crismon, Patrick McGettigan, and Armando Oyola-Delgado, conspired to intercept e-mails between KB Home and Dueall Construction. KB Homes claims that the three gained access to a WiFi hotspot used by Dueall.
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Contractor Prevailing Against Subcontractor On Common Law Indemnity Claim
June 29, 2020 —
David Adelstein - Florida Construction Legal UpdatesCommon law indemnity is not an easy claim to prove as the one seeking common law indemnity MUST be without fault:
Indemnity is a right which inures to one who discharges a duty owed by him, but which, as between himself and another, should have been discharged by the other and is allowable only where the whole fault is in the one against whom indemnity is sought. It shifts the entire loss from one who, although without active negligence or fault, has been obligated to pay, because of some vicarious, constructive, derivative, or technical liability, to another who should bear the costs because it was the latter’s wrongdoing for which the former is held liable.
Brother’s Painting & Pressure Cleaning Corp. v. Curry-Dixon Construction, LLC, 45 Fla. L. Weekly D259b (Fla. 3d DCA 2020) quoting Houdaille Industries, Inc. v. Edwards, 374 So.2d 490, 492-93 (Fla. 1979).
Not only must the one seeking common law indemnity be without fault, but there also needs to be a special relationship between the parties (indemnitee and common law indemnitor) for common law indemnification to exist. Brother’s Painting & Pressure Cleaning Corp., supra (citation omitted). A special relationship has been found to exist between a general contractor and its subcontractors. Id. at n.2.
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David Adelstein, Kirwin Norris, P.A.Mr. Adelstein may be contacted at
dma@kirwinnorris.com
Housing Starts in U.S. Surge to Seven-Year High as Weather Warms
May 20, 2015 —
Sho Chandra – BloombergNew residential construction in the U.S. surged in April to the highest level in more than seven years, indicating the industry has moved beyond a weather-related soft patch to regain strength.
Housing starts jumped 20.2 percent to a 1.14 million annualized rate, the most since November 2007, from a 944,000 pace in March, a Commerce Department report showed Tuesday in Washington. The median forecast of 83 economists surveyed by Bloomberg was 1.02 million. More permits, a proxy for future construction, were issued than at any time since June 2008.
An improving labor market and mortgage costs close to multiyear lows are reviving residential construction, a sign that the weakness in early 2015 was probably due to harsh winter weather. Builders including PulteGroup Inc. have said the spring selling season is off to a good start, and sentiment data for May showed developers are optimistic about the next six months.
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Shobhana Chandra, Bloomberg
Beyond the Disneyland Resort: Museums
May 03, 2018 —
Beverley BevenFlorez-CDJ STAFFNorth Orange County has a variety of interesting museums from intimate to extravagant to peruse.
Bowers Museum, located in Santa Ana, has several special exhibitions on display around WCC Seminar: Endurance: The Antarctic Legacy Of Sir Ernest Shackleton And Frank Hurley, American Visionary: John F. Kennedy’s Life And Times, Gemstone Carvings: The Masterworks Of Harold Van Pelt, And First Americans: Tribal Art From North America.
Muzeo, a Museum and Cultural Center located in Anaheim, will be showcasing the Trash Artist Challenge Expo & Exhibition from May 12th -27th, and also has on permanent display Anaheim: A Walk through Local History.
Star Wars and Disney fans will want to make their way to the
Hilbert Museum of California Art. In the city of Orange, this museum is located at Chapman University. Two of their many exhibitions include Magical Visions: The Enchanted Worlds Of Eyvind Earle (Disney’s Sleeping Beauty designer) and A New Hope: The Star Wars Art of Robert Bailey.
Learn about American history at the
Richard Nixon Library, located in nearby Yorba Linda.
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Wall Street Journal Analyzes the Housing Market Direction
June 26, 2014 —
Beverley BevenFlorez-CDJ STAFFNick Timiraos of the Wall Street Journal listed “five takeaways” from this week’s housing reports. First, he stated that unless the May “seasonally adjusted annual rate isn’t revised down,” the sales of new homes were “at their highest levels in six years.”
Second, Timiraos claimed that “[s]ales have been soft, in part, because builders have been slow to ramp up production. While inventories are still very low, they are up 16% from last year.” For his final “takeaway,” Timiraos stated that while “home prices are up nearly 25% from their early 2012 levels, they’re still down 18% from their 2006 peak. There’s considerable variation, of course, from one city to another. Prices in Denver and Dallas have reached new highs. Others, such as Miami and Phoenix, have posted double digit increases over the past year, but prices are still off of their peak by more than a third.”
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Third Circuit Follows Pennsylvania Law - Damage Caused by Faulty Workmanship Does Not Arise from an Occurrence
May 10, 2013 —
Tred EyerlyThe Third Circuit followed Pennsylvania law in determining that damage caused by faulty workmanship did not arise from an occurrence. Zurich Am. Ins. Co. v. R. M. Shoemaker Co., 2013 U.S. App. LEXIS 6093 (3d Cir. March 27, 2013).
The County sued R. M. Shoemaker, alleging faulty construction of an addition to a correctional institution. The County alleged Shoemaker negligently supervised its subcontractor, thereby permitting the subcontractor to engage in willful misconduct, resulting in damage to structural elements of the correctional institution. The County alleged that Shoemaker's negligence permitted water to intrude, damaging the electrical systems, acoustic ceilings and miscellaneous equipment.
Zurich sought a declaratory judgment that it was not required to defend or indemnify Shoemaker. The district court granted Zurich summary judgment. Relying on Pennsylvania law, the district court found that the allegations in the underlying action did not arise from an occurrence.
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Tred EyerlyMr. Eyerly can be contacted at
te@hawaiilawyer.com
New Case Law Alert: Licensed General Contractors Cannot Sue Owners to Recover Funds for Work Performed by An Unlicensed Subcontractor
May 30, 2022 —
Michele A. Ellison & Samantha R. Riggen - Gibbs GidenThe opinion in Kim v. TWA Construction, Inc. (2022 Cal. App. LEXIS 412) issued by the Court of Appeal of California Sixth Appellate District, on May 13, 2022, makes it clear that a properly licensed general contractor cannot bring an action for compensation from an owner for work performed by an unlicensed subcontractor.
California licensing law has long made explicit that an unlicensed contractor cannot bring or maintain any action to collect or recover compensation for work that contractor performed unless they were duly licensed at all times during the performance of that work. This new ruling extends the scope of this restriction to licensed contractors who hired unlicensed subcontractors.
The Underlying Dispute
The case involved a dispute between property owners and their former general contractor and its principal (collectively “TWA”). The property owners hired TWA to construct a home, and during the early stages of the project, TWA hired an unlicensed subcontractor to perform tree trimming services and to remove a large eucalyptus tree. The subcontractor partially removed the eucalyptus tree, but was stopped by a neighbor, and it was discovered that the tree was partly located on the neighbor’s property. The neighbor brought suit against the property owners, and eventually TWA, for the damage. The property owners subsequently filed a cross-complaint against TWA, and TWA in turn filed a cross-complaint against the property owners.
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Michele A. Ellison, Gibbs Giden and
Samantha R. Riggen, Gibbs Giden
Ms. Ellison may be contacted at mellison@gibbsgiden.com
Ms. Riggen may be contacted at sriggen@gibbsgiden.com
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