Washington Supreme Court
Atherton Condo Apartment-Owners Ass'n Bd of Directors v. Blume Dev. Co.
November 1, 1990115 Wash. 2d 506
Summary
The court affirmed summary judgment dismissing the owners' negligent-construction, nuisance, architect-liability, and municipal-liability claims, but reversed dismissal of the implied-warranty and fraudulent-concealment claims against the developer. It also upheld dismissal of two owners' express-warranty claims while allowing a third to proceed because the evidence created a factual dispute about a pre-sale representation concerning stucco. The court held that alleged violations of fundamental fire-resistance requirements could fall within the implied warranty of habitability and that evidence of the developer's knowledge, rather than proof of intent to conceal, was sufficient to avoid summary judgment.
Holding
- Implied warranty of habitability. Alleged violations of fundamental fire-safety provisions governing the construction of the condominium's floors and ceilings fall within the potential scope of the implied warranty of habitability and could not be dismissed as a matter of law on summary judgment.
- Fraudulent concealment. The owners presented sufficient evidence to create factual disputes on fraudulent concealment, and the claim should not have been dismissed on summary judgment.
- Negligent construction and negligence per se. The owners could not recover purely economic repair costs through a negligent-construction claim, and negligence per se did not provide a separate cause of action.
- Nuisance. The nuisance claim was properly dismissed because it merely recast the alleged negligent construction as nuisance.
- Public duty doctrine and failure-to-enforce exception. The public duty doctrine barred the owners' claims against the city and its building officials, and the failure-to-enforce exception did not apply because the owners lacked evidence that the officials had actual knowledge of an inherently hazardous condition in the buildings as constructed.
- Motion to strike expert affidavits. The trial court properly denied the motion to strike because the owners did not show prejudicial error.
Docket 56677-1
Cited authorities
- 57 Wash. L. Rev. 139
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