Residential Real Estate Sales Disputes
As with most laws in California, the laws controlling the purchase and sale of residential real estate are complicated, particularly where disclosures are concerned.
Loosely stated, the seller of residential property with one to four units, has both a common law and a statutory duty to disclose all facts known to the seller about the property that would materially affect the value or desirability of that property, that the seller knows, or should know, are not known to, or within the reach of the diligent attention and observation of the buyer.
A similar duty to disclose is owed by the real estate broker for the seller and requires the broker to also disclose to the buyer all facts known to the broker regarding the property or relating to the transaction that materially affect the value or desirability of the property that broker knows or should know that the buyer is not aware of and cannot reasonably be expected to discover through diligent attention and observation.
Full disclosures are required to ensure that home buyer knows as much as reasonable possible about the property to allow the buyer to appropriately evaluate whether to purchase the property, and to determine the price the buyer is willing to pay for that property.
Where a dispute does arise, buyers and sellers rely on us to help them navigate through the dispute.
These disclosures cannot be avoided by the seller or broker using “as-is” provision in the sales contract nor by claiming that the seller thought the buyer knew about the undisclosed issue without the need for including it among the seller’s disclosures.
The duty to disclosure, and the risk attendant to seller’s failure to disclosure is made even more onerous by the fact that most residential sales contracts provide for an award of attorneys’ fees and costs to the prevailing party in any litigation resulting from a non-disclosure.
Millions of homes are sold in California every year and most of those sales conclude without dispute.