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From the Las Vegas Sun

March 13, 2006

Letter: Extrapolation punishes the good with the bad

Brian Wargo's March 9 article, "Building their cases - legislation sought to clarify whether home defects can be grouped in class action," should send a message to all potential new homeowners in Nevada.

I have worked in the construction industry for over 30 years in the Las Vegas Valley and I have never seen the type of shenanigans that are being perpetrated against honest, credible contractors. Many of the construction defect lawsuits are fabricated.

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From the Las Vegas Sun

March 01, 2006

Nailing door shut on class action

More expensive construction suits seen

By Brian Wargo
Las Vegas Sun

Clark County homeowners are finding it more difficult to band together to sue builders in construction-defect cases as judges increasingly force the homeowners to wage tougher, potentially costlier, legal battles.

The recent court decisions, which some lawyers complain could keep many people with flawed houses from pursuing legal remedies, come in response to a state Supreme Court ruling in December that nullified a multimillion-dollar judgment in a North Las Vegas home construction-defect case.

In the past two weeks judges in three separate cases have issued decisions that significantly undercut homeowners' ability to use so-called class action cases to sue builders accused of faulty work.

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Appeals Court Protects Right to Gripe Online

In a victory for free speech on the Internet, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit today reversed a district court decision restricting the ability of a homebuilding company's customer to air his dissatisfaction on a gripe Web site.

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Copyright © 2003-2005 ConsumerAffairs.Com Inc.

 

North Dakota Supreme Court Rules Homeowner Can Sue Over Missed Code Violations

 

 

National Arbitration Forum Decision kbhomesucks.com

DECISION

KB Home v. RegisterFly.com- Ref# 9323034 c/o Whois Protection Service- ProtectFly.com

Claim Number: FA0506000506771

 

PARTIES

Complainant is KB Home (“Complainant”), represented by Mary Kathryn Sammons, of Susman Godfrey LLP, Suite 5100, 1000 Louisiana, Houston, TX 77002-5096.  Respondent is RegisterFly.com- Ref# 9323034 c/o Whois Protection Service- ProtectFly.com (“Respondent”), represented by John Glenn Meazell, of Law Offices of John Meazell, P.C., 5608 West Plano Parkway, Suite 300, Plano, TX 75093.

REGISTRAR AND DISPUTED DOMAIN NAME 

The domain name at issue is <kbhomesucks.com>, registered with Enom, Inc.

See rest of case here 

 

Centex Homes settles lawsuit: Defects linked to expansive soils

By Steve Raabe
Denver Post Business Writer

Centex Homes has agreed to settle a major class-action lawsuit filed by homeowners claiming damage from expansive soils.

Terms of the settlement call for as many as 1,500 Colorado homeowners to receive repairs in homes that cracked and heaved when underlying soil expanded and pushed upward.

The settlement is the latest in a series of legal proceedings in which homebuilders and developers have agreed to pay millions of dollars to fix damaged homes.

Owners of more than 15,000 metro Denver homes have been involved in expansive-soil lawsuits during the 1990s, as development has moved into southern and southwestern suburbs where the harmful soils are prevalent.

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Possible KB Home and Richmond American Homes Class Action Lawsuit

KB Home and Richmond American Homes

Class action status is being sought in a lawsuit filed against KB Home and Richmond American Homes of California Inc. on behalf of homeowners in the Haysley Hills development. The suit alleges that KB Home underestimated the costs of maintaining the neighborhood, and is now charging residents association dues that are double the amount that they were told they would have to pay per month.

Possible KB Home and Richmond American Homes Class Action Lawsuit

If you feel you qualify for damages or remedies that might be awarded in this possible class action please click the link below to submit your complaint.
Click here to submit your complaint through a secure form
to Kabateck & Garris - Brian Kabateck
Posted on Jul-6-04
©2001-2006 Online Legal Marketing Ltd. All rights reserved.

 

E mail from HADD Secretary, cschnackel@hotmail.com

Hello, I'm the national secretary for Homeowners Against Deficient Dwellings.  One of the issues we see in most complaints is how home buyers are hamstrung by mandatory arbitration clauses in builder and warranty contracts.  Arbitration prevents the customer from suing if the builder does not hold up their end of the bargain.  Instead, disputes are heard privately by a supposedly neutral arbitrator.  The problems are too many to post here, but one of the main ones is the potential for bias in favor of the industry, since arbitrators do repeat business with the industry, not the individual home owners.  A home owner still needs to hire a lawyer for arbitration, too.  It can be hard to find a good lawyer because these cases aren't profitable unless they are class action lawsuits, usually.

That said, there is one strong possibility to avoid the arbitration clause in a warranty policy if the buyer has a government insured mortgage.  It is Title 24 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Section 203.204(g).  (Citation: 24 CFR 204.204(g))  Be sure to give your lawyer that information if you have a govt insured mortgage and are being told you must arbitrate.  He or she should be able to use it to your advantage.  This is information I got from HADD when I first had my construction defect case, and I used it successfully myself.  Some volunteer in the distant past had apparently found this regulation and it became part of the cumulative knowledge of HADD.  The warranty companies know this but unless YOU know it and work to enforce it they will not necessarily follow it.  Sadly, we don't know of any examples where it was determined if the regulation applies to strictly builder contracts; this is in regard to "warranties," which can be a 3rd party company.  Your lawyer can advise you.

 

E mail from Janet Ahmed, President, HOBB.

IN SUPPORT OF NEVADA NEW HOME LEMON LAW

The building industry has quite possibly destroyed what was once a highly regarded profession that employed highly skilled craftsmen that built with pride.

In a recently published article titled A Dismal Standard by a veteran builder, Tedd Benson wrote:

“…most of the roughly 1.5 million houses built every year are pieced together in a wasteful, antiquated way that has changed remarkably little in 150 years. While many industries have reinvented themselves, taking advantage of cutting-edge technologies and innovative management styles, home building has not. As a result, new homes are an overly defective product, many of which will be lucky to survive their mortgage.”

Many of us can vividly recall the unreliable cars of the 60’s and 70’s with ineffective one-year warranties.  With the passage of Car Lemon Laws in all 50 states that all changed, and it gave an incentive to both foreign and domestic manufactures to build better cars.

Today’s cars are more reliable, longer-lasting; have life-saving safety features, and manufacturer’s now warrant cars up to 12 years. 

However, for the past two decades, homebuilding quality has been headed south and new home warranties are worthless. If a lemon law worked to assure better built cars, why did lawmaker not provide the same protections for new homebuyers you ask? 

The reason is the building industry aggressively concentrated on marketing techniques to sell their products, created lucrative lending practices, built with a growing emphasis on using the cheapest products and unskilled labor available.

Most new homes are now constructed with approximately 80% recycled paper-based products that predispose to the growth mold.  Add unskilled labor to the mix subjecting homes to water intrusion and then families are stuck with the dilemma of sick molded houses with worthless warranties.

The industry has successfully sought the passage of laws that limit builder responsibility and protect them from liability for defective home construction.  To assure success and greater profits they pushed an agenda to restrict buyers from exercising their constitutional right of recourse under the law by inserting binding arbitration clauses in contracts as a condition to the purchase of a new home.

The industry is steadfast with their profitable agenda on building defective homes bigger, more grandiose with an illusion of quality to entice buyers.  For decades a new well-built home has progressively become a thing of the past that will worsens unless we demand the passage of a home lemon law that will assure that homes are once again made with pride in America.   

I encourage every to join  http://lasvegaslemonade.org/ to make a difference.

Visit our website http://www.hobb.org and read:
Binding Arbitration

Mortgage Fraud

Janet Ahmad, National President of HomeOwners for Better Building

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