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Swinson v. Lords Landing Village Condominium9/8/2000
Negligent misrepresentation: Provision of false or misleading information by Condominium Council of Unit Owners on Resale Certificate, pursuant to Real Property Article § 11-135, may create liability to purchaser of unit who relies on that information.
In August, 1994, petitioner, Winifred Swinson, purchased a condominium unit in the Lords Landing Village Condominium (LLVC). Subsequent to her purchase of the unit, LLVC made a special assessment on the unit owners to defray the cost of repairing or replacing rotted or exposed wood and flaking paint on the exterior of the condominium buildings, in conformance with a housing code Violation Notice issued by the Prince George's County Department of Environmental Resources. Petitioner refused to pay the assessment, claiming (1) that LLVC gave false and misleading information in a Certificate of Resale that was supplied to her in connection with her purchase of the unit, and (2) that, in any event, by virtue of § 13-103 of the Prince George's County Code, either LLVC or the person from whom she purchased the unit was liable for the assessment.
The District Court of Maryland and, on appeal, the Circuit Court for Prince George's County, held that petitioner was liable for the assessment and that LLVC was not liable to her by reason of the information it supplied in the Certificate of Resale. Although we do not agree with all of the reasons given by the two lower courts for their respective decisions, we agree that their judgments were correct. We therefore shall affirm the judgment of the Circuit Court which, in turn, affirmed the judgment of the District Court.
BACKGROUND
Maryland Code, § 11-135(a) of the Real Property Article, which is part of the Maryland Condominium Act, provides that a contract for the resale of a condominium unit by a unit owner other than the developer is not enforceable unless the unit owner furnishes certain documents to the purchaser. One of the documents required to be provided is a certificate disclosing, among other things, "the existence of any pending suits to which the council of unit owners is a party" and whether the Council of Unit Owners "has knowledge of any violation of the health or building codes with respect to the unit, the limited common elements assigned to the unit, or any other portion of the condominium." (Emphasis added). Some of that information may not be known to the unit owner. Accordingly, § 11-135(c) requires the Council of Unit Owners to "furnish a certificate containing the information necessary to enable the unit owner to comply with subsection (a) of this section."
In 1992, LLVC, aware of chipping paint and deteriorating wood on the outside surfaces of the condominium buildings, came to the conclusion that the developer of the condominium had used defective wood products on the exterior of the buildings and, accordingly, sued the developer for damages. On March 30, 1994, while that suit was pending in the Circuit Court for Prince George's County, the Prince George's County Department of Environmental Resources issued a Violation Notice to LLVC, care of Linda Wells, Property Manager. The Violation Notice informed LLVC that an inspection the day before revealed that several buildings throughout the project had exposed wood, rotting boards, and flaking, peeling paint and directed LLVC to repair or replace the rotted wood to a sound condition and apply a weather resistant protective coating to all exposed wooden surfaces by April 30, 1994. The Notice cited, as the ordinance violated by the conditions noted, Prince George's County Housing Code, § H-321.2. According to Ms. Wells, the county agreed to defer any enforcement action while the suit against the dev
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