Interesting how a US company gets sued, a German company might be getting sued and probably will, but the makers of the drywall, China, doesn’t get touched. Maybe it’s time the Federal government stop trade with China. It will definitely hurt their economy, create many new jobs in America and abroad, and we can start paying off our debt to them with all of our new tax revenue from the creation of more jobs. Of course, we should hold back what they owe us from the bad drywall, lead painted toys, and whatever else we’ve paid for in regards to their poor products. And if they don’t like it, too bad, we don’t like the products they sent us knowningly hurting our American citizen’s health.
China has been poisoning us for years, flooding our economy with defective products and manipulating their currency to make their goods cheaper. It is time to start turning their ships back at the coast until they improve their safety standards. If we had a manufaturing base in this country, we wouldn’t have this problem, but government has run off most of it. No wonder we have the financial problems that we do.
I’m guessing you’ve shopped at Wal Mart in the past 20 years, right? Our endless appetite for low cost merchandise brought us to where we are now. Yet even Wal Mart is reporting that “end of month” sales are in the toilet.
Hey, maybe all you nut job tea baggers will get your way and Michelle Bachmann will be POTUS. She has great ideas like “if we just eliminated the minimum wage we could solve our unemployment problem because there would be jobs available at whatever level.”
So Matt, I guess you enjoy buying defective, poisonous products from China because they are cheap. I actually wouldn’t mind paying a little more for these things if I knew they were made here in the US and had some safety standards before being sold. You know why Wal Mart sales are down? People have to stock up at the first of the month because their unemployment checks only go so far and they are paying so much more for gas and other items due to inflation. All of this caused by Progressive Socialist policies in the past 2 years. By the way, Bachman would be 100 times better than the current POTUS because she will stop the Progressive march to Socialism and help restore the country’s economy and way of life.
Matt – Hard to fathom what your comment has to do with the Chinese drywall problem!!! The Chinese drywall was not a “cheap alternative” – it was imported because of a drywall shortage caused by the housing bubble and rebuilding after Katrina. The impurities in the DW were typical of poor Chinese QC on all of their commodities. The lawsuits targeted companies with assests in the USA – even though the Chinese company is owned by a chinese government entity. no one has been able to find a way to get a judgement against them.
Oh the tangled webs we weave. They will have fun with this getting the Chinese to pay anything in the end. I wonder how Knauf got excused from this. Must have had some good attorneys.
Knauf got release from Banner–that suit/complaint was not part of this lawsuit–
Banner will have to sue Knauf and prove intent to deceive on Knauf’s part–
that the company knew the drywall WAS defective and basically committed fraud by getting the release signed–that Knauf lied to Banner and that is probably much more difficult to prove than this suit…
The Chinese Drywall diaster moves on, but we certainly can not bypass the cause which led to this Toxic diaster. One must pull all parties into the web to make sure everyone understands that this type of Fraud will not be tollerated. When the lies and deception went on for years in Florida one can only assume the only ones who did not know were unsuspecting homeowners. The 1 million dollar question comes to mind is why didn’t Parkland Commisioners contact the State of Florida’s Attorney Generals office and let them investigate the selling of worthless properties to the general public. If people were doing their jobs how many homeowners would not have been taken over with CDW.
It is aparently clear that the brunt of this diaster is on the homeowners, with a host of consequences which some will never recover. I have to stick with my conviction that Fraud and Deceptive business practice has to be addressed in a swift judicial manner, for the costs are to great to be bore by society.
Knauff owned the mfg plant in China. The Chinese had nothing to do with this. Knauf got a hold harmless agreement from Banner. Now THAT is good lawyering. Banner should sue their counsel for that one…
Just because Knauf owned the plant in China does not mean that the Chinese who were making the product did not know what they were putting into the drywall. They have been poisoning their products with lead for years and unsuspecting US companies have been importing the products because they are cheap. I am not cutting the Chinese any slack on this fiasco.
Sounds like a big number. However, when the attorneys get through carving out their take, it will leave all the homeowners to fight over the scraps. Assuming the $55,000,000 is correct, and the customary 40% is charged by the lawyers, it leaves $33,000,000 to be divided by approximately 800 claims. That works out to a little over $40,000 per home. On an average home, that’s about 1/3 to 1/2 what normal repairs will run. Homeowners will still be faced with footing the bill themselves or asking a lender to help out with additional money to be added to the mortgage (which is some cases are upside down to begin with). Bottom line… If you have a home with Chinese drywall, and you didn’t win the lottery this past week, you’re screwed!!
$55M does not even begin to cover the damages to tens of thousands of homes with this problem. Because of the CPSC and EPA rulings the only remedy is to remove the drywall completely which is to essentially gut the home – costs varying from $25 – $150 per sq. ft. depending upon the value of the home. Until the drywall is replaced the homes are unsaleable. Best solution for the owner is to walk away and leave the home to foreclosure. Since the mortagages are likely insured by one of the many GSEs – the taxpayer will end up footing the bill.
The real issue with the proposed settlement is logistics. The supplier’s insurance affiliates will not take the 54.4 million dollars, subtract the documented NTE (Not To Exceed) 32% for attorney’s fees and then divide up the remainder among the affected. Each individual will have to provide adequate documentation and evidence of the reactive board and that it was provided by the individual supplier prior to any monies changing hands. The burden will be on the homeowner or the representing attorney to provide this evidence. During the era of drywall shortfalls or shortages it has been my experience that very few homes (based upon averages) are constructed with 100% of any specific type of drywall and many developments share many different suppliers dependent on availability. In a very well crafted press release by Foreman and Associates the amount of liability for the supplier could be as low as $39.00 +/- per sheet of drywall. So, for instance, the average home has between 125 to 150 sheets of drywall lest there are atypical ceiling heights or other anomalies. Given this information… a 2,000 square foot home with average ceiling heights would contain roughly 125 sheet of 4′ X 12′ drywall. Once the homeowner has proven that 100% of the drywall was reactive and provided by the supplier… The effected homeowner is left with 125 sheets times $39 for a grand total of $4,875.00. This would be the amount the supplier would be responsible to pay before the supplier deducted the attorney’s fees. $4,875.00 less 32% is $3,315.00 for one individual home owner who was lucky enough to provide sufficient documentation to trigger a payable claim. $3,000 is not even remotely enough to cover the costs of the demolition method for remediation. This amount has no coverage for temporary housing, the temporary storage of household items and furniture, the physical moving of said items or the damage that has already occurred to air conditioning coils and other household items. $3,000 will not cover an alternative method to demolition to neutralize the emissions. Here is another interesting question… For the lucky few, who will the check be written to? Is this personal injury litigation? Certainly, the monies will not be paid to the homeowner, as in most cases, the “homeowner” is not the actual “owner”. The bank or mortgage service owns the home (or manages the home). I do not think, the check would or “legally” be issued to the homeowner. Since the funds could be used for anything including reactive drywall or anything aside from that the homeowner has prioritized. Likely the monies will be issued by a check payable to more than one party to ensure the corrections can be ensured to have occurred. The interesting question is… How can anyone ensure that the corrections have been made without enough funds to make the corrections?
It would appear that there are many people preoccupied with trade with other countries and we are not making any implications to that effect. That is a totally separate issue. The issue here is that there are up to, and maybe more than, 100,000 “homeowners” stuck in this paradox between the attorneys, supplier, manufacturers, builders, developers, etc… This argument does not solve the issues surrounding reactive drywall for the person that has to live inside the confines of issue. Every individual should be concerned as to HOW to remedy the issue so that these innocent individuals can resume their lives.
What you are trying to say Interceptor is that this is a colossal mess and the Homeowners are up the creek without a paddle. I see this case going on for years without much relief. What are these poor people supposed to do in the meantime for livable quarters? The attorneys don’t care and the builders, developers all have this in litigation. Do you think they will voluntarily go in and replace all this wallboard to make the people whole? I think not.
Agent: That is not what I am trying to say. I am trying to relay the information as it is received. Here is what happens, in my opinion… Every ounce of litigation is segregated between the different channels of construction from the manufacturer to the builder to the homeowner (I realize that I left several increments out). This represents multiple individuals and business’ in the chain of events that may or may not be culpable for the current status of the issue. I have followed this very closely for almost 3 years.
It is a colossal mess with little to no help for the homeowner for the expense of returning the home to not just livable but “normal” or better than “normal” living conditions. I just cannot see where the funding is going to come from for this event. Everyone has turned their heads to the situation. There are thousands of people living in homes with this issue and the HOA refuses to let them take control of their own home to make it livable again. The management from the HOA does not live in a home with reactive drywall so they have no sense of urgency about it. Therefore, there are people trapped within the very same walls they helped create.
The Homeowners who purchased or had homes built had the reasonable expectation that the home was built with approved materials. The builders saw an opportunity for greater profit since the drywall was less expensive than American made drywall. They probably did not know at the time that the Chinese drywall was made with toxic materials, but anyone who is paying attention should be looking at any Chinese product with a jaundiced eye. I blame the builder, distributor and manufacturer for this mess. How can these people be made whole again is the question. With attorney’s involved, it is likely to be years.
Agent:
I am a builder and a certified general contractor. I had an opportunity to purchase 360,000 sheets of Chinese Drywall. As it turns out the brand that was offered to me was not reactive. I did not purchase any of it… thank goodness. I can also tell you that, from my experience, that the drywall was not discounted until sometime in 2006 when it started to become an issue. The individuals that were installing the product as early as 2001, that is reactive, were unaware of the implications (I am assuming based on research). There were many homes built without knowledge of the drywall issue and there were many built, in my opinion, with full knowledge. This just means that the debacle is even deeper now. I believe that this, after 10 years of being in the U.S. and 4 to 5 years of being an issue, is just the crust of the pie. I do not think the attorneys are delaying the resolve at all. It is clear that the government is not playing an active role in this issue so if it were not for the attorneys this may not be getting any of the attention that it is getting today. Now, please do not take that as “defense” for the attorneys but, in some cases, they are the necessary evil. You asked how these people can be whole again and you said that it may be years. These people will never be whole again. With the economy, crashing home values and everything else that compounds this issue it will eventually become a national issue that will burden the tax payer.
The required funds are not coming from anywhere… anytime soon.
I wish everyone with this issue the best of luck. I will also advise to them… every time your attorney tells you that the settlement is just around the corner! Just roll your eyes and wait for the proof.
There are several solid alternative solutions out there that are affordable. Unfortunately, most cannot consider any solution because the disposable funds are just not available.
Is it any wonder that the Insurance Market does not like to provide General Liability on contractors who construct homes or subs who install products. If they do, there is a “Defective Products” exclusion which would include these things like Chinese Drywall. Claims can be very expensive and they want no part of it.
That is why insurance is so expensive these days and not awarded to just every contractor. It is extremely difficult to get bonding these days because so many other contractors walk away from projects. Legislation in the coming years is what is needed to prevent this instance from occurring again. I think that will happen but, in the meantime, we need to figure out how to help the affected homeowners so all of these homes do not end up in foreclosure. A significant number of them already have. An even larger number are vacant awaiting foreclosure and without funding, laws and a cost effective remediation… The remainder will be foreclosed. Then it will become the mortgage service’s caveat that will likely add another “layer” of confusion to the labyrinth the home owner and home buyer will have to endure.
Interesting how a US company gets sued, a German company might be getting sued and probably will, but the makers of the drywall, China, doesn’t get touched. Maybe it’s time the Federal government stop trade with China. It will definitely hurt their economy, create many new jobs in America and abroad, and we can start paying off our debt to them with all of our new tax revenue from the creation of more jobs. Of course, we should hold back what they owe us from the bad drywall, lead painted toys, and whatever else we’ve paid for in regards to their poor products. And if they don’t like it, too bad, we don’t like the products they sent us knowningly hurting our American citizen’s health.
China has been poisoning us for years, flooding our economy with defective products and manipulating their currency to make their goods cheaper. It is time to start turning their ships back at the coast until they improve their safety standards. If we had a manufaturing base in this country, we wouldn’t have this problem, but government has run off most of it. No wonder we have the financial problems that we do.
I’m guessing you’ve shopped at Wal Mart in the past 20 years, right? Our endless appetite for low cost merchandise brought us to where we are now. Yet even Wal Mart is reporting that “end of month” sales are in the toilet.
Hey, maybe all you nut job tea baggers will get your way and Michelle Bachmann will be POTUS. She has great ideas like “if we just eliminated the minimum wage we could solve our unemployment problem because there would be jobs available at whatever level.”
So Matt, I guess you enjoy buying defective, poisonous products from China because they are cheap. I actually wouldn’t mind paying a little more for these things if I knew they were made here in the US and had some safety standards before being sold. You know why Wal Mart sales are down? People have to stock up at the first of the month because their unemployment checks only go so far and they are paying so much more for gas and other items due to inflation. All of this caused by Progressive Socialist policies in the past 2 years. By the way, Bachman would be 100 times better than the current POTUS because she will stop the Progressive march to Socialism and help restore the country’s economy and way of life.
Matt – Hard to fathom what your comment has to do with the Chinese drywall problem!!! The Chinese drywall was not a “cheap alternative” – it was imported because of a drywall shortage caused by the housing bubble and rebuilding after Katrina. The impurities in the DW were typical of poor Chinese QC on all of their commodities. The lawsuits targeted companies with assests in the USA – even though the Chinese company is owned by a chinese government entity. no one has been able to find a way to get a judgement against them.
Oh the tangled webs we weave. They will have fun with this getting the Chinese to pay anything in the end. I wonder how Knauf got excused from this. Must have had some good attorneys.
500-800 homeowners share the $55M settlement, yet as many as 100,000 homes are affected?
500-800 are probably part of the class action suit. There are probably 100,000 lawyers involved though.
Knauf got release from Banner–that suit/complaint was not part of this lawsuit–
Banner will have to sue Knauf and prove intent to deceive on Knauf’s part–
that the company knew the drywall WAS defective and basically committed fraud by getting the release signed–that Knauf lied to Banner and that is probably much more difficult to prove than this suit…
The Chinese Drywall diaster moves on, but we certainly can not bypass the cause which led to this Toxic diaster. One must pull all parties into the web to make sure everyone understands that this type of Fraud will not be tollerated. When the lies and deception went on for years in Florida one can only assume the only ones who did not know were unsuspecting homeowners. The 1 million dollar question comes to mind is why didn’t Parkland Commisioners contact the State of Florida’s Attorney Generals office and let them investigate the selling of worthless properties to the general public. If people were doing their jobs how many homeowners would not have been taken over with CDW.
It is aparently clear that the brunt of this diaster is on the homeowners, with a host of consequences which some will never recover. I have to stick with my conviction that Fraud and Deceptive business practice has to be addressed in a swift judicial manner, for the costs are to great to be bore by society.
Knauff owned the mfg plant in China. The Chinese had nothing to do with this. Knauf got a hold harmless agreement from Banner. Now THAT is good lawyering. Banner should sue their counsel for that one…
Just because Knauf owned the plant in China does not mean that the Chinese who were making the product did not know what they were putting into the drywall. They have been poisoning their products with lead for years and unsuspecting US companies have been importing the products because they are cheap. I am not cutting the Chinese any slack on this fiasco.
China owns us or should I say, “U.S.!” Good luck with all that political stuff!
Sounds like a big number. However, when the attorneys get through carving out their take, it will leave all the homeowners to fight over the scraps. Assuming the $55,000,000 is correct, and the customary 40% is charged by the lawyers, it leaves $33,000,000 to be divided by approximately 800 claims. That works out to a little over $40,000 per home. On an average home, that’s about 1/3 to 1/2 what normal repairs will run. Homeowners will still be faced with footing the bill themselves or asking a lender to help out with additional money to be added to the mortgage (which is some cases are upside down to begin with). Bottom line… If you have a home with Chinese drywall, and you didn’t win the lottery this past week, you’re screwed!!
$55M does not even begin to cover the damages to tens of thousands of homes with this problem. Because of the CPSC and EPA rulings the only remedy is to remove the drywall completely which is to essentially gut the home – costs varying from $25 – $150 per sq. ft. depending upon the value of the home. Until the drywall is replaced the homes are unsaleable. Best solution for the owner is to walk away and leave the home to foreclosure. Since the mortagages are likely insured by one of the many GSEs – the taxpayer will end up footing the bill.
The real issue with the proposed settlement is logistics. The supplier’s insurance affiliates will not take the 54.4 million dollars, subtract the documented NTE (Not To Exceed) 32% for attorney’s fees and then divide up the remainder among the affected. Each individual will have to provide adequate documentation and evidence of the reactive board and that it was provided by the individual supplier prior to any monies changing hands. The burden will be on the homeowner or the representing attorney to provide this evidence. During the era of drywall shortfalls or shortages it has been my experience that very few homes (based upon averages) are constructed with 100% of any specific type of drywall and many developments share many different suppliers dependent on availability. In a very well crafted press release by Foreman and Associates the amount of liability for the supplier could be as low as $39.00 +/- per sheet of drywall. So, for instance, the average home has between 125 to 150 sheets of drywall lest there are atypical ceiling heights or other anomalies. Given this information… a 2,000 square foot home with average ceiling heights would contain roughly 125 sheet of 4′ X 12′ drywall. Once the homeowner has proven that 100% of the drywall was reactive and provided by the supplier… The effected homeowner is left with 125 sheets times $39 for a grand total of $4,875.00. This would be the amount the supplier would be responsible to pay before the supplier deducted the attorney’s fees. $4,875.00 less 32% is $3,315.00 for one individual home owner who was lucky enough to provide sufficient documentation to trigger a payable claim. $3,000 is not even remotely enough to cover the costs of the demolition method for remediation. This amount has no coverage for temporary housing, the temporary storage of household items and furniture, the physical moving of said items or the damage that has already occurred to air conditioning coils and other household items. $3,000 will not cover an alternative method to demolition to neutralize the emissions. Here is another interesting question… For the lucky few, who will the check be written to? Is this personal injury litigation? Certainly, the monies will not be paid to the homeowner, as in most cases, the “homeowner” is not the actual “owner”. The bank or mortgage service owns the home (or manages the home). I do not think, the check would or “legally” be issued to the homeowner. Since the funds could be used for anything including reactive drywall or anything aside from that the homeowner has prioritized. Likely the monies will be issued by a check payable to more than one party to ensure the corrections can be ensured to have occurred. The interesting question is… How can anyone ensure that the corrections have been made without enough funds to make the corrections?
It would appear that there are many people preoccupied with trade with other countries and we are not making any implications to that effect. That is a totally separate issue. The issue here is that there are up to, and maybe more than, 100,000 “homeowners” stuck in this paradox between the attorneys, supplier, manufacturers, builders, developers, etc… This argument does not solve the issues surrounding reactive drywall for the person that has to live inside the confines of issue. Every individual should be concerned as to HOW to remedy the issue so that these innocent individuals can resume their lives.
What you are trying to say Interceptor is that this is a colossal mess and the Homeowners are up the creek without a paddle. I see this case going on for years without much relief. What are these poor people supposed to do in the meantime for livable quarters? The attorneys don’t care and the builders, developers all have this in litigation. Do you think they will voluntarily go in and replace all this wallboard to make the people whole? I think not.
Agent: That is not what I am trying to say. I am trying to relay the information as it is received. Here is what happens, in my opinion… Every ounce of litigation is segregated between the different channels of construction from the manufacturer to the builder to the homeowner (I realize that I left several increments out). This represents multiple individuals and business’ in the chain of events that may or may not be culpable for the current status of the issue. I have followed this very closely for almost 3 years.
It is a colossal mess with little to no help for the homeowner for the expense of returning the home to not just livable but “normal” or better than “normal” living conditions. I just cannot see where the funding is going to come from for this event. Everyone has turned their heads to the situation. There are thousands of people living in homes with this issue and the HOA refuses to let them take control of their own home to make it livable again. The management from the HOA does not live in a home with reactive drywall so they have no sense of urgency about it. Therefore, there are people trapped within the very same walls they helped create.
I’m not saying… I’m just saying.
The Homeowners who purchased or had homes built had the reasonable expectation that the home was built with approved materials. The builders saw an opportunity for greater profit since the drywall was less expensive than American made drywall. They probably did not know at the time that the Chinese drywall was made with toxic materials, but anyone who is paying attention should be looking at any Chinese product with a jaundiced eye. I blame the builder, distributor and manufacturer for this mess. How can these people be made whole again is the question. With attorney’s involved, it is likely to be years.
Agent:
I am a builder and a certified general contractor. I had an opportunity to purchase 360,000 sheets of Chinese Drywall. As it turns out the brand that was offered to me was not reactive. I did not purchase any of it… thank goodness. I can also tell you that, from my experience, that the drywall was not discounted until sometime in 2006 when it started to become an issue. The individuals that were installing the product as early as 2001, that is reactive, were unaware of the implications (I am assuming based on research). There were many homes built without knowledge of the drywall issue and there were many built, in my opinion, with full knowledge. This just means that the debacle is even deeper now. I believe that this, after 10 years of being in the U.S. and 4 to 5 years of being an issue, is just the crust of the pie. I do not think the attorneys are delaying the resolve at all. It is clear that the government is not playing an active role in this issue so if it were not for the attorneys this may not be getting any of the attention that it is getting today. Now, please do not take that as “defense” for the attorneys but, in some cases, they are the necessary evil. You asked how these people can be whole again and you said that it may be years. These people will never be whole again. With the economy, crashing home values and everything else that compounds this issue it will eventually become a national issue that will burden the tax payer.
The required funds are not coming from anywhere… anytime soon.
I wish everyone with this issue the best of luck. I will also advise to them… every time your attorney tells you that the settlement is just around the corner! Just roll your eyes and wait for the proof.
There are several solid alternative solutions out there that are affordable. Unfortunately, most cannot consider any solution because the disposable funds are just not available.
You are more than correct in your belief.
Is it any wonder that the Insurance Market does not like to provide General Liability on contractors who construct homes or subs who install products. If they do, there is a “Defective Products” exclusion which would include these things like Chinese Drywall. Claims can be very expensive and they want no part of it.
That is why insurance is so expensive these days and not awarded to just every contractor. It is extremely difficult to get bonding these days because so many other contractors walk away from projects. Legislation in the coming years is what is needed to prevent this instance from occurring again. I think that will happen but, in the meantime, we need to figure out how to help the affected homeowners so all of these homes do not end up in foreclosure. A significant number of them already have. An even larger number are vacant awaiting foreclosure and without funding, laws and a cost effective remediation… The remainder will be foreclosed. Then it will become the mortgage service’s caveat that will likely add another “layer” of confusion to the labyrinth the home owner and home buyer will have to endure.