Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: Home Owners Assoc. negligence

Mr. Whipple's advice is, as usual for him, correct and helpful. But does the HOA have insurance coverage for the damages caused, is it really a management company you are going against and not the HOA, etc. You are the HOA and there is no point in suing yourself unless only part of the complex suffered damages and you are trying to get the whole complex to share the burden of the damages or there is insurance coverage.

Re: Home Owners Assoc. negligence

Winning a negligence case requires that the plaintiff establish the following:

(1) That Defendant owed Plaintiff a duty to do something, or to refrain from doing something;

(2) Defendant breached the duty in some material (significant) way;

(3) That Plaintiff suffered legally-conizable (usually monetary) harm, which can be compensated by some legal remedy, usually money damages; and

(5) Plaintiff's harm flowed both logically and proximately (forseeably) from Defendant's breach of duty.

You will need testimony (and probably evidence) to prove each of the foregoing elements. This means an expert to testify about the HOA's duties and responsibilities in this arena; a technical guy to discuss why the lack of proper maintenance caused too much water to accumulate, which in turn caused the foundations to settle; and a contractor type to give testimony substantiating the owners' dollar claims for damages.

Cases like this are often won or lost based on the credibility of the expert testimony. Make sure there is no weak link in the chain. For example, it does no good to prove the excess water was certainly the cause of $2 million in damage to foundations unless you also prove it was the HOA's responsibility and their handling of that responsibility fell below reasonable expectations of competence and diligence.