Powderidge Unit Owners Association, Plaintiff Below, Appellant v. Highland Properties, Ltd.; Virginia Homes…

Summary

The Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia affirmed summary judgment for the developer, manufacturer, and insurer in a condominium construction-defect negligence action, holding the 1991 suit was barred by the two-year statute of limitations because the association knew or by reasonable diligence should have known of the water-infiltration injury and its source by 1984 and offered no admissible evidence supporting the discovery exception. The court held summary judgment was not precipitously granted: the plaintiff received roughly sixteen months of discovery and never invoked Rule 56(f), for which the court announced a four-part substantial-compliance test for informal requests. The court also held the circuit court did not abuse its discretion in denying the plaintiff's motion for reconsideration, which, filed more than ten days after judgment, had to be treated as a Rule 60(b) motion and failed both Rule 60(b) and Rule 56(e) because the supporting Bell affidavit was never tendered to the circuit court.