Home drainage problems, usually groundwater in a crawl space or basement, damages properties.
Groundwater problems, ie. home drainage problems, has become one of the fastest growing segments of home based litigation in the country.
Probably next to lot line disputes, one of the more litigated home issues.
Next to lot line disputes and contractor lawsuits, groundwater damage law suits are close to… the top of the list these days.
Groundwater entry that causes home drainage problems, as well as peoples attempts to solve those problems in the past, have become one of the most litigated group of issues in Oregon real estate law today.
Only the pros play in that sticky legal quagmire. The ones I know who do, also write proposals for public programs, submitted the Oregon state legislature, and are at a whole different level of expertise than your average lawyer.
Many sellers do not disclose known home drainage problems in their Oregon home sellers property disclosure statement, and they are quite self assured and bold, even though legal non-disclosure penalties for doing so are in place, and homeowners think they know what they are gambling, and who they are messing with. Turns out these types of sellers are just shooting themselves in the foot, for no good reason than fear itself.
Many home sellers feel that to acknowledge even the correction of a home drainage problem makes it less likely for their home to appeal to most home buyers.
They don’t want exposed river rock exposed at the surface of the hand excavated french drain, for instance. Or this word or that should be changed in the contract. Like the words, home drainage problem, for example. I understand, and comply, but still give them my speech anyway. I am a glutton for punishment, I guess.
It is simply another version of the big bird sticking his head in the sand when flustered, thinking everything will just change by the time he pops up. These sellers are funny really.
These non-problem disclosing home seller types stand a very good chance of being sued by informed buyers who are just plain sick of it.
Not a week goes by that this subject is not made part of a conversation, and I am again having another conversation about it.
The gloves are coming off, and it can become a, figuratively, bare knuckle courtroom brawl many times, based on anger instead of logic and science.
Home sellers may feel because home drainage is so poorly understood among the public that they can weasel through the process under the radar. They often are right, and do.
A quietly evolving bad precedent has been set by slip sliding non disclosing home sellers, making new generations of these weasels more bold even yet.
The damaged buyers usually want to get everthing they can from these fraudulent types of home sellers, when groundwater visits again, after the installation of a sump pump system, that was never a solution to the problem, like they were told, if they were told at all, and became the type of home buyers that were forced to chase a former owner to get them into court, or to agree to a settlement of some sort.
This issue is a real hotbed of activity among informed and angry home buyers who have been lied to about home drainage. If they formed a protest on the streets of downtown Portland, it would likely appear to resemble a major event spectacle. Not exactly folks of a festive mood however.
Sellers are many times so stupid when it comes to home drainage problem non disclosure that it amazes me. The neighbors probably know what the over all drainage health of that particular home is anyway, and of the neighborhood in general. Just ask them. You will be amazed at what they think they know about groundwater problems in their subdivison or area. Be prepared for stories of underground rivers and springs located right under everyones homes however. There-in starts another mystery solved in other articles, about how sump pump installers convince home sellers or owners to think they need a sump pump installed, when they almost never do.
Of course none of those neighbor homeowners that you will talk to have ever installed and benefited from hand excavated french drains and proper rain drain discharges installed, so living with the notion that the sump pump keeping their basement or crawl space perpetually wet is the best they can do has to be good enough for them.
It is not true, but they will be convinced it is true.
Most of these types of homeowners will aggressively attack any other suggestion a professional home drainage contractor may advance, that would invalidate their premise that a river or spring exists under their home.
They have already dumped thousands on a failed home drainage system. You bet they will defend the logic of installing it. It is only natural.
They have been scammed and they are usually visually upset as well.
When confronted, these types of homeowners may be very angry, and defend their system of failure first. It is human nature. This subject is discussed in long detail in many articles in this website.
The former neighbors might even make statements that everyone in the neighborhood knew that those non-disclosing home sellers always had groundwater problems, as many of the neighbors still do.
They will make those types of statements in front of witnesses, after the home is closed and the new buyers have discovered the groundwater problems, and the old sellers think they are long gone and free weasels.
Try to get the neighbor to talk to you earlier than that, before you write the earnest money agreement. It can prevent you from buying a home drainage pig, with problems no one has been able to fund or solve, and not one you want to start dumping money into, from a home drainage perspective.
As a practical matter, these same neighbors will be drug into court, willingly, to reiterate there statements in front of a judge and jury, if you need them later, as well.
Seems like many of these non-disclosing home sellers are so stupid as to think that after they have gotten the check, and boogied off into the sunset, that they have become untouchable, and cannot be found. And they are so very wrong.
Most non-disclosing home sellers think that an “as is” clause in the earnest money agreement is going to protect them after the closing of the home, despite the fraud that these former home sellers have perpetrated on the new buyers, and the lender as well in most cases, and all the federal regulations that pertain to the laws governing bank fraud that they have broken.
Many times home inspections do not identify the groundwater problems from last winter because the “smart”, non-disclosing home sellers have had the crawlspace dried out and have replaced the moisture barrier before selling it. Selling before the rains come in winter.
Lenders many times do not require sellers to do groundwater drainage work, even after it is disclosed by a home inspection and is backed by a proposal for work from a licensed, bonded and insured professional home drainage contractor.
This has been one of the lending industries own downfalls. One of many. The public is paying for them, but the industry created them.
They never kept up with their own properties, from a home drainage perspective, and therefore suffer from problems caused by their own ignorance.
Banks are stuffed full of stuffed shirts in ties, and attitudes. Not one of them probably could describe a hand excavated french drain groundwater removal system.
Lenders REO departments, real estate owned, everywhere, but especially in rain country, like the pacific northwest of American, are stuffed with homes, off the market, with home drainage problems lenders say they cannot afford to solve, so they say.
In the past, lenders have usually not made the home groundwater drainage work a condition of approval for the loan to the new buyer, but they will make the dryrot damage that the lack of home drainage causes a contingency of the loan. Doesn’t make much sense does it? What do you expect from this elite group of scum bags.
Those lenders knew they were encouraging seller non-disclosure of home drainage problems and were actually setting a precedent of fraud in violation of their own quality standards. As a result, they now have gotten bad thousands and thousands of these home drainage pigs. Not even the smart lenders are spending the kind of cash on some of these homes that is required to solve the problem, and stop the groundwater from entering below grade, damaging the home.
Some buyers accept the statement from the home sellers that there has never been any home drainage problems, without any of their own investigation.
They believe that, never ever, has there been a home drainage problem at the home. Someone not focused on looking for home drainage groundwater signs will just take that statement as fact, as most homes do not have home drainage problems. Seldom will the home drainage problem that is found not be one that cannot be solved with hand excavated french drains and new rain drain discharges installed at a compacted foundation splash block for maximum hard rain run off away from the home, which includes all that roof water coming into the downspouts and out the rain drain discharges.
The buyers find out too late that indeed the groundwater drainage issue was public knowledge, and has been a big problem for a very long time.
The home drainage groundwater causes problems may be making the home sick with mildew and mold spores as well as damaging it from a structural standpoint.
Now those home buyers are really pissed off.
Some time has gone by since they bought the home, they are moved in, and don’t feel like being shoved around anymore with this home drainage issue. The gloves are coming off.
The worst of this story is that occasionally people are living in homes that could be making them sick without them even knowing it, even though they may have bought into the problem and received money for doing so at closing of escrow, after the former, now present, home drainage problem was discovered, without enough time or money to solve the problem, prior to closing of escrow.
Another subject covered in other articles. How home inspectors make late disclosure a service to lenders, and perpetrate, what perhaps is a referral system from home inspectors to sump pump installers that has them both agreeing and benefiting, when homeowners are being damaged from these systems being installed in lieu of a real home drainage groundwater removal solution that collects the groundwater before it saturates, is is below grade to be pumped.
First time home buyers, as well as widows and orphans, are the worst victims of this fraud.
Here comes the lawsuit. A smart attorney will turn that into a paycheck for the new homeowners, if they can prove former knowledge by the seller of the groundwater problem. Rightly so, I feel.
It may not take the sellers admitting to know about the problems if neighbors step to your side and confront them as liars in court.
Game, set, match.
Proving pre-existing home drainage problems may not be so hard as you think. Many times neighbors who never really liked the former homeowners that well anyway are happy to help the newly damaged home buyers, and testify in court on behalf of the new buyers. Piece of cake. A slam dunk.
The most successful law suits to recover are backed with a completed contract for the installation of the system, hand excavated french drains, that actually solved the home drainage problems.