Fairfield Connecticut Building Expert Directory

New York’s Highest Court Reverses Lower Court Ruling That Imposed Erroneous Timeliness Requirement For Disclaimers of Coverage

June 18, 2014 — Robert F. Walsh and Paul A. Briganti – White and Williams LLP
On June 10, 2014, the New York Court of Appeals (the state’s highest court) issued a unanimous decision in KeySpan Gas East Corp. v. Munich Reinsurance America, Inc. (No. 110, June 10, 2014), reversing a lower court decision which had erroneously imposed on insurers a duty to disclaim coverage for property damage claims as soon as possible or risk waiving their coverage defenses. White and Williams represented one of the insurance company defendants in the action. The case involved an action against three excess insurers for insurance coverage for underlying environmental claims arising from Manufactured Gas Plant sites. Upon receiving notice of the underlying claims, the three insurers reserved their rights to deny coverage on various grounds, including late notice of an occurrence, pending an investigation. The insurers ultimately denied coverage on the basis of late notice several years later based on information developed in discovery in the litigation. The policyholder/plaintiff KeySpan argued that the insurers had unreasonably delayed in issuing their disclaimers and that there was a triable issue of fact on whether such a delay amounted to a waiver of the late notice defense. Reprinted courtesy of Robert F. Walsh, White and Williams LLP and Paul A. Briganti, White and Williams LLP Mr. Walsh may be contacted at walshr@whiteandwilliams.com; Mr. Briganti may be contacted at brigantip@whiteandwilliams.com Read the court decision
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History and Gentrification Clash in a Gilded Age Resort

October 05, 2020 — Alex Ulam - Bloomberg
Newport, Rhode Island, is a small New England beachfront town with a permanent population of 26,000 and an amazing collection of historic homes. Billed as “America’s First Resort,” the 350-year-old city on Aquidneck Island hosts more than 3 million tourists every year. They come for the boating, the famous folk and jazz festivals (both canceled this summer), and the architecture. The narrow streets of the Point along the waterfront are lined with hundreds of modest homes from the early 1700s, one of the largest ensembles of colonial architecture in the country. On Historic Hill sits an assortment of grander antebellum, classical and Gothic Revival structures from the latter part of the 18th and early to mid-19th century, many built by Southern plantation owners. Newport also boasts what is probably the most opulent thoroughfare in the country, a several-mile stretch of Bellevue Avenue lined with shade trees and palatial limestone mansions built by Gilded Age robber barons and industrialists. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Alex Ulam, Bloomberg

Good Signs for Housing Market in 2013

December 20, 2012 — CDJ STAFF
Dan Green, a loan officer at Waterstone Mortgage, is optimistic about the construction market in 2013. He notes that the rise in building permit, housing starts, and housing completions are all good signs. Mortgage rates are still low, making these new homes attractive to buyers. Read the court decision
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Bad Faith Claim for Inadequate Investigation Does Not Survive Summary Judgment

May 20, 2015 — Tred R. Eyerly – Insurance Law Hawaii
The insured's claim for bad faith investigation regarding their hail damage claim did not survive the insurer's motion for summary judgment. Amarillo Hospitality Tenant, LLC v. Mass. Bay Ins. Co., 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 56228 (N. D. Tex. April 29, 2015). A hailstorm caused damage to the Courtyard Marriot. The day after the storm, the insured inspected the roof of the hotel and observed damage to a sign and some aluminum vent tubes. No damage to the roof itself was observed. Subsequently, leaks were found on the tenth floor of the hotel. A public adjuster concluded that the roof had sustained damage during the hailstorm. The insured filed a claim with Massachusetts Bay Insurance Company. The insurer paid for the cost of repairing the damaged sign. To determine whether the damage to the roof was caused by the hailstorm, the insurer hired Donna Engineering, who conducted two inspections of the roof. Both inspections concluded that the hailstorm did not cause damage to the roof. Consequently, the claim was denied. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Tred R. Eyerly, Insurance Law Hawaii
Mr. Eyerly may be contacted at te@hawaiilawyer.com

Miller Wagers Gundlach’s Bearish Housing Position Loses

May 19, 2014 — Alexis Leondis – Bloomberg
Bill Miller said investor Jeffrey Gundlach and real estate billionaire Sam Zell are wrong about housing. Gundlach, the chief executive officer of DoubleLine Capital LP, and Zell, chairman of landlord Equity Residential, predict fewer young people will buy homes, further driving down the U.S. ownership rate. Miller, the stock picker who beat the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index for a record 15 years, said he’s so confident lending and housing will rebound that he’s betting on mortgage insurers, homebuilders and subprime servicers. “Anytime there’s a cataclysm, people always say it’s never going to come back,” said Miller, 64, sitting outdoors at a table overlooking Baltimore’s harbor. “I don’t believe there’s been a secular change in demand for housing. People may just rent longer than they otherwise would have before eventually buying.” Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Alexis Leondis, Bloomberg
Ms. Leondis may be contacted at aleondis@bloomberg.net

Just How Climate-Friendly Are Timber Buildings? It’s Complicated

February 12, 2024 — Eric Roston - Bloomberg
This article is part of the Bloomberg Green series Timber Town, which looks at the global rise of timber as a low-carbon building material. The number of people living in urban areas around the world will swell by upwards of 2 billion over the next three decades. Many of those people will need new homes. But building those with conventional materials would unleash a gusher of carbon dioxide: Concrete, steel, glass and bricks for construction make up a combined 9% of global CO2 emissions, according to research by the United Nations Environment Program. Enter engineered wood, a seemingly no-brainer solution. Mass timber is not the typical lumber that has structured single-family houses in North America for decades. The wood components are strong enough to hold up an office tower or apartment block, and building with them is thought to emit much less CO2 than using standard materials. And since wood is about 50% carbon, the material itself even stores a little carbon, to boot. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Eric Roston, Bloomberg

When Is a Project Delay Material and Actionable?

January 11, 2022 — Rick Erickson - Snell & Wilmer Real Estate Litigation Blog
Welcome to 2022! This year, the construction industry will undoubtedly reflect on the last two years as unprecedented times plagued by construction project delays. The COVID-19 pandemic contributed to suspension of work and closure of construction projects worldwide in 2020. The end of 2021 brought additional delays caused by an inexplicable clog in the supply chain of construction materials. The combined impact of these events on project milestones and completion deadlines led our clients to ask, with unusual and particular urgency, who is liable for such delays and how do contracting parties lessen the consequences from such unexpected and uncontrollable delays. Granted that project delays are nothing new or unusual. They were common enough before inflation caused shipping complications and pandemic decimated the construction labor force. All delays, whatever the source, variably cause loss to all players on a construction project. But not all delays matter when it comes to claims and remedies available to the contracting parties in dispute resolution, where the determinative focus is on material delays impacting the entire project and on delays the claimant can credibly prove. Most, if not all, jurisdictions interpret actionable delays from the contract documents for the project. The contract is definitely where you should start before pursuing any delay remedies. Delay remedies may be a time extension only, or a time extension plus your additional general conditions. Some delay remedies may be barred by the contract’s express terms and may be enforced adversely by the courts when such contract terms are indisputable. See Quinn Constr. v. Skanska USA Bldg., Inc., 730 F. Supp. 2d 401, 411 (D.C. Pa. 2010) (enforcing the subcontractor’s contractual waiver of claims for delay and disruption damages). On the other hand, delay damages that are expressly allowed by the contract—like overtime necessitated by the delays—are usually actionable and recoverable. Id. However, not only the contract terms, but applicable law, may affect the outcome. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Rick Erickson, Snell & Wilmer
Mr. Erickson may be contacted at rerickson@swlaw.com

Insurers Need only Prove that Other Coverage Exists for Construction Defect Claims

August 27, 2013 — CDJ STAFF
Writing on the Sheppard Mullin web site, Scott Hennigh looks at the implications of the 2012 California case Axis Surplus Insurance. A condominium complex was covered by two insurance policies, covering different time periods. During a construction defect claim, one insurer argued that the claim was not covered. The other insurer settled and sued that both needed to contribute to the settlement. The court held that when multiple insurers are in conflict, the burden to prove that coverage does not exist lies solely on the party claiming it. Read the court decision
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