I have asthma too, as such I would make sure the place I am purchasing meets my medical needs not blame someone else. People need to take responsibility for their own actions and stop blaming others.
If the woman has asthma, she wouldn’t have purchased the place if she believed second hand smoke was the cause of the odor, no asthmatic would. If on the other hand her broker told her the smell was from a prior owner and would go away and she trusted the broker she might. She lost the case because she couldn’t prove the conversation with her broker ever occurred. It was a he said she said situation. It’s not frivolous. What the woman should have done is create an email trail of her concerns. She would have won at that point. Lesson, get it in writing.
I have a question, and curious to see what people think. I lived in an apartment in 2000. This was a nice, family oriented complex, it and we had made sure that the noise levels, etc… were all accetable to us. In 2003, the landlord, whom for some reason did not like us, moved in 4 transient workers undeneath us. Their cigarette smoke came up through the kithen, once to the point we thought the place was on fire as the smoke rolled out when we opened the cabinets underneath the sink.
The place started smelling like a hotel room that you enter that allowed smoking in it. Complaining got us no where. As such, we moved out a month early to a house we bought and sued for our security deposit back based on the cigarette smoke forcing our hand. We lost.
Were we wrong, and if so in what way? The smokers moved in after us, their smoke invaded out space that we paid for. The lease stated that the contract was void if either party did not live up to the agreement. The lease guarunteed us a peacful living condition. They broke the contract in our opinion, and therefore we no longer had a contract to break, and moved out. The local magistrate who makes his money off business taxes saw it differently.
You cant choose your neighbors. If you do not want neighbors that smoke, drink, have kids or play loud music, move into a cave. It is the price you have to pay for living in an apartment or condo.
Cave? Why a cave? A single family house will do. I believe most townships, municipalities, etc… have noise ordinances, trespassing laws, etc…
If one needs to have renter’s insurance to cover the inside possessions, then that is the same as owining a home and you should be able to expect a certain level of privacy.
Cigarette smoke coming up from your kitchen cabinets that looks like a forest fire does not meet that
You are missing the point and this is a frivoulous lawsuit and she should pay. It is not the brokers responsibility. If someone is concerned about the potential of second hand smoke smell they should not live in a condo. Would you expect the Broker to guarantee that no one who is a smoker will ever move in or have visitors that smoke. Ridiculous, we all pay for these type of suits.
The Broker LIED!! Plain and simple. So sue the crap out of them, but yes, have a paper trail showing they lied. The he said/she said, rarely works. What has this world come to if dishonest people control it. Oh, I know, the US Government!!
I’ve lived in an apartment once. Everytime I opened the bathroom cabinets it would smell like smoke. You guessed it. The people downstairs were smoking. Complex wouldn’t do anything about it. Such as making some buildings smoking vs non-smoking or allowing me out when my lease was up. Yes in an apartment you will get some noise, but when did cigarrette smoke become your neighbor’s problem. I also lived in a house where neighbors smoked outside. Everytime they did, I had to close my patio door. No, but that is considered life so just closed the door. No lawsuit. But an apartment you can’t close a door or a window to stop it. So I guess some of you would be fine when you’re 55 and living in a retirement community and sign a lease, then the next day they decide to open it up to young families. I hope that happens to some of you that are condemning this lady. Then when you sue, we can all say, grow up, that’s life, you should pay all legal fees, blah blah blah….
It is the brokers fault if the broker told her the smell was from a previous owner and that it would go away. If she knew the smoke was going to be on going she wouldn’t have bought the place.. she’s asthmatic. The representation the broker allegedly made was material to the woman’s purchase of the condo.
So, those of you who disagree think a jury of the plaintiff’s peers who sat through all the testimony and deliberated less than one hour were wrong? Who are you, Cliff Clavin?
You are so confused. No one said the jury was wrong. You must be reading a different website. We are discussing if she should have even had a case. Some say no, some say yes. The jury decided. This Marty is called due process of law. She had her time in court and lost. With the sounds of it, she didn’t have anything saying what the broker told her. So it just shows, you must have something in writing before making a purchase. She must not have, and honestly if I was on the jury and she had no proof, I would have given the win to the broker too.
here is where the individual should have taken some responsibility and had inspected the condo better. yes, if the condo had a owner that smoked, it would linger for a bit (just like a car does or the elevator). but she can’t control her neighbors, so she should have asked or talk to neighbors. now, you would not think in most cases that odors can travel that badly unless it’s the dead walking or living in the walls. she could have helped herself and had an investigation done after the fact knowing that the odor had not gone away. she could have spent money on her own to help w/the ventilation to remove the odor.
look, many folks are trying to get money because they feel that someone else’s pocket is bigger. we should in fact have a law on frivilous lawsuits that you should pay all costs including the defendents when you lose!
What does that have to do with it? How does that condition affect whether or not the plaintiff should be required to pay when they loose? Suppose the condo owner or broker was a smoker and they lost the suit and a judgement was awarded against them, should that have affected the pay out? That kind of logic would forestall payment for any judgement.
not frivolous? To file a lawsuit with only he-said, she-said as grounds is the kind of thing I expect to hear in the sandbox at the playground, not out in the “real” world, where we deal in facts, or at least legal findings of fact. Go back to school…
so your rights are more important than other people’s “rights”, huh?…and I quote: “They broke the contract in our opinion, and therefore we no longer had a contract to break, and moved out. The local magistrate who makes his money off business taxes saw it differently”…the problem again is opinion, and it took a magistrate to rule that your opinion was just that, an opinion, not a fact. sorry you lost, I know I don’t like smokers either but I also know that it is not against the law to smoke, even if it bothers others.
you know, i was thinking. would this not be like stepping into a bar that allows smoking (although, many state now have a ban on smoking or you have to create a separate space and ventilation system for them) and then sue the bar for allowing the smokers in? — or we even continue to sue the cigarette makers for the second hand smoke?
Rex:
We don’t know that the broker lied. First it is not documented that he said it and secondly perhaps the previous owners were smokers and he assumed that the smell would fade in time. I don’t see where he guaranteed her that nobody in the building were smokers.
Baxter:
Moving into a 55 and older is a different situation because generally there are bylaws documenting the age restrictions and if they were going to change it to a family condo the association would have to vote to change the bylaws. I believe that kind of thing has happened in some communities. Totally different scenario.
This is an interest forum discussion.
In order for her to appeal she would have to bring new info.
Yes, the law should be changed and the loser should pay the victors court cost. That would help to keep the frivolous law suits to a minimum. Right now they have nothing to lose and may get a decent nuisance settlement. Frustrating!
Only way to stop this BS is to have the looser pay the Court costs & defendant’s legal costs WITHIN the tort system – automatically.
Judgement for defendant – pay the Baliff before you can leave. Or we’ve got three hots and a cot for you AND your lawyer. You can be roomies.
Obviously you are not an asthmatic.
Yah, asthmatics should be allowed to file frivolous lawsuits. But only asthmatics. The rest of us should have to pay if we lose.
I have asthma too, as such I would make sure the place I am purchasing meets my medical needs not blame someone else. People need to take responsibility for their own actions and stop blaming others.
If the woman has asthma, she wouldn’t have purchased the place if she believed second hand smoke was the cause of the odor, no asthmatic would. If on the other hand her broker told her the smell was from a prior owner and would go away and she trusted the broker she might. She lost the case because she couldn’t prove the conversation with her broker ever occurred. It was a he said she said situation. It’s not frivolous. What the woman should have done is create an email trail of her concerns. She would have won at that point. Lesson, get it in writing.
I have a question, and curious to see what people think. I lived in an apartment in 2000. This was a nice, family oriented complex, it and we had made sure that the noise levels, etc… were all accetable to us. In 2003, the landlord, whom for some reason did not like us, moved in 4 transient workers undeneath us. Their cigarette smoke came up through the kithen, once to the point we thought the place was on fire as the smoke rolled out when we opened the cabinets underneath the sink.
The place started smelling like a hotel room that you enter that allowed smoking in it. Complaining got us no where. As such, we moved out a month early to a house we bought and sued for our security deposit back based on the cigarette smoke forcing our hand. We lost.
Were we wrong, and if so in what way? The smokers moved in after us, their smoke invaded out space that we paid for. The lease stated that the contract was void if either party did not live up to the agreement. The lease guarunteed us a peacful living condition. They broke the contract in our opinion, and therefore we no longer had a contract to break, and moved out. The local magistrate who makes his money off business taxes saw it differently.
You cant choose your neighbors. If you do not want neighbors that smoke, drink, have kids or play loud music, move into a cave. It is the price you have to pay for living in an apartment or condo.
Cave? Why a cave? A single family house will do. I believe most townships, municipalities, etc… have noise ordinances, trespassing laws, etc…
If one needs to have renter’s insurance to cover the inside possessions, then that is the same as owining a home and you should be able to expect a certain level of privacy.
Cigarette smoke coming up from your kitchen cabinets that looks like a forest fire does not meet that
GOOD!
You are missing the point and this is a frivoulous lawsuit and she should pay. It is not the brokers responsibility. If someone is concerned about the potential of second hand smoke smell they should not live in a condo. Would you expect the Broker to guarantee that no one who is a smoker will ever move in or have visitors that smoke. Ridiculous, we all pay for these type of suits.
The Broker LIED!! Plain and simple. So sue the crap out of them, but yes, have a paper trail showing they lied. The he said/she said, rarely works. What has this world come to if dishonest people control it. Oh, I know, the US Government!!
I’ve lived in an apartment once. Everytime I opened the bathroom cabinets it would smell like smoke. You guessed it. The people downstairs were smoking. Complex wouldn’t do anything about it. Such as making some buildings smoking vs non-smoking or allowing me out when my lease was up. Yes in an apartment you will get some noise, but when did cigarrette smoke become your neighbor’s problem. I also lived in a house where neighbors smoked outside. Everytime they did, I had to close my patio door. No, but that is considered life so just closed the door. No lawsuit. But an apartment you can’t close a door or a window to stop it. So I guess some of you would be fine when you’re 55 and living in a retirement community and sign a lease, then the next day they decide to open it up to young families. I hope that happens to some of you that are condemning this lady. Then when you sue, we can all say, grow up, that’s life, you should pay all legal fees, blah blah blah….
correction, “before” my lease was up.
It is the brokers fault if the broker told her the smell was from a previous owner and that it would go away. If she knew the smoke was going to be on going she wouldn’t have bought the place.. she’s asthmatic. The representation the broker allegedly made was material to the woman’s purchase of the condo.
So, those of you who disagree think a jury of the plaintiff’s peers who sat through all the testimony and deliberated less than one hour were wrong? Who are you, Cliff Clavin?
Sounds like the whole case went up in smoke!
You are so confused. No one said the jury was wrong. You must be reading a different website. We are discussing if she should have even had a case. Some say no, some say yes. The jury decided. This Marty is called due process of law. She had her time in court and lost. With the sounds of it, she didn’t have anything saying what the broker told her. So it just shows, you must have something in writing before making a purchase. She must not have, and honestly if I was on the jury and she had no proof, I would have given the win to the broker too.
How could one ever think that. OJ was innocent? Get real!
here is where the individual should have taken some responsibility and had inspected the condo better. yes, if the condo had a owner that smoked, it would linger for a bit (just like a car does or the elevator). but she can’t control her neighbors, so she should have asked or talk to neighbors. now, you would not think in most cases that odors can travel that badly unless it’s the dead walking or living in the walls. she could have helped herself and had an investigation done after the fact knowing that the odor had not gone away. she could have spent money on her own to help w/the ventilation to remove the odor.
look, many folks are trying to get money because they feel that someone else’s pocket is bigger. we should in fact have a law on frivilous lawsuits that you should pay all costs including the defendents when you lose!
What does that have to do with it? How does that condition affect whether or not the plaintiff should be required to pay when they loose? Suppose the condo owner or broker was a smoker and they lost the suit and a judgement was awarded against them, should that have affected the pay out? That kind of logic would forestall payment for any judgement.
not frivolous? To file a lawsuit with only he-said, she-said as grounds is the kind of thing I expect to hear in the sandbox at the playground, not out in the “real” world, where we deal in facts, or at least legal findings of fact. Go back to school…
so your rights are more important than other people’s “rights”, huh?…and I quote: “They broke the contract in our opinion, and therefore we no longer had a contract to break, and moved out. The local magistrate who makes his money off business taxes saw it differently”…the problem again is opinion, and it took a magistrate to rule that your opinion was just that, an opinion, not a fact. sorry you lost, I know I don’t like smokers either but I also know that it is not against the law to smoke, even if it bothers others.
you know, i was thinking. would this not be like stepping into a bar that allows smoking (although, many state now have a ban on smoking or you have to create a separate space and ventilation system for them) and then sue the bar for allowing the smokers in? — or we even continue to sue the cigarette makers for the second hand smoke?
this is why it’s ridiculous…
Rex:
We don’t know that the broker lied. First it is not documented that he said it and secondly perhaps the previous owners were smokers and he assumed that the smell would fade in time. I don’t see where he guaranteed her that nobody in the building were smokers.
Baxter:
Moving into a 55 and older is a different situation because generally there are bylaws documenting the age restrictions and if they were going to change it to a family condo the association would have to vote to change the bylaws. I believe that kind of thing has happened in some communities. Totally different scenario.
This is an interest forum discussion.
Why isn’t she appealing this decision?
And why aren’t the losers forced to pay? A law change is in order.
In order for her to appeal she would have to bring new info.
Yes, the law should be changed and the loser should pay the victors court cost. That would help to keep the frivolous law suits to a minimum. Right now they have nothing to lose and may get a decent nuisance settlement. Frustrating!