Damages From a Landslide & Other Danger From Property
Liability can exist for the failure to safely maintain property, which causes others to suffer damages. That said, landslide cases can be difficult. For example, the defendant usually blames “Mother Nature,” saying the rain was an “act of God” that made his property move onto yours. A Pittsburgh lawyer at our Western PA firm can evaluate your claim for landslide damage or other injuries.
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Recovering Money For Landslide Damage
If you suffered damage to your property from movement via a landslide, you are probably wondering about compensation. Unfortunately, homeowner insurance policies exclude coverage for the movement of land. Therefore, even though you may have homeowner insurance coverage, it may not cover damage to your home from a landslide.
When your insurance will not compensate you, then you should consider bringing a claim on the owner of the property that slid into yours or that caused yours to otherwise become unstable. You should have an attorney do this as there exist important deadlines, discussed below.
Claims Against the Government For a Landslide
Often, the owner of dangerous property is the government.
For claims against a government entity, numerous barriers to recovery may exist. For example, your lawyer must serve formal written notice to the governmental entity at issue, within six months of the damage. Plus, there are also caps on liability. For example, for claims on municipalities, the cap is only $500,000 total — for all claimants to share. And yet the clean-up costs — alone — from a landslide can exceed $1M.
Finding Insurance to Cover a Landslide
As mentioned, homeowner insurance will not cover damage to the homeowner’s property from a landslide. When CBS News asked Yours Truly about this issue, relative to a recent landslide in Pittsburgh, CBS reported:
Strip District residents affected by landslide worried about future damage
“With homeowners insurance, it doesn’t usually cover landslides. If insurance companies did, they’d go broke,” attorney Todd Elliott said.
Elliott represents several people who’ve lost parts of, and in some cases, all of their property due to landslides.
“You can make a claim against others in the area that may have had anything to do with destabilizing the hillside,” Elliott added.
Elliott says collecting against government agencies is a tough go. “They may not have insurance themselves. Not all governments are required to have insurance,” Elliott added. “You have to be pretty creative to get compensated.”
Duties Of a Landowner
In Pennsylvania, the party sustaining damages must prove negligence to recover a money judgment related to a landslide. There is no “strict liability” for the maintenance of property. You have to show how the person responsible for the property was negligent. Perhaps a person or entity added weight to the hillside. Or, the uphill owner of land negligently maintained their land, which moved onto yours. Either way, your lawyer will check the county property records to see who owns the property uphill from yours, which moved.
Checklist To Evaluate Your Landslide Claim
Once you know the identify of the owner(s) of property that moved and damaged yours, you have to ask some more questions about the owners: Is the owner:
a.) Did a Governmental Entity Cause the Landslide Or Condition?
There are certain limits to governmental liability, such as the time period during which you must sue or serve and file formal notice of your claim (six months). There are also financial caps on liability where a governmental entity is involved. Plus, there are different rules for local and city governments (or “local agency”) versus the Commonwealth, for the latter, click here.
Overall, governmental entities are generally immune from suit, unless your attorney can find that your claims fits within one of the exceptions to immunity, as our Pittsburgh lawyers work to do. If your claim concerns a defect of governmental property, your case may fall within the “real property” exception to immunity, but there are issues for your lawyer to consider in terms of finding a way to make your case fit an exception to immunity.
b.) Who is Responsible For the Defective or Moving Property?
The mere fact of ownership of a property does not necessarily create responsibility for harm caused by a defect of the property. It may be the case that the owner leased the property to someone else, and the owner had no knowledge and was not “negligent” in terms of maintaining the property because the tenant’s use of the property is what caused the harm, with no knowledge on the part of the owner. Or, it may be the case that the owner or tenant hired a management company that was negligent. You will need to also sue the management company, to trigger said company’s insurance coverage to add to the possible sources of compensation.
c.) Was a Builder or Contractor Responsible for the Defect?
You have to ask, did a contractor or sub-contractor do work on the property as to make the property dangerous? For example, did the contractor: (a) fail to get an engineer’s opinion prior to commencing work? (b) construct a structure, or barrier, or retaining wall, or sidewalk, in a negligent manner, causing your injuries or damages to your property? (c) failure to take into account complaints or issues post-construction that would give the contractor a reason to re-visit the property before any movement would occur.
c.) How Long Ago did the Improvement to Land Happen, Destabilizing it?
This is key because in PA, there is a twelve year statute of repose, meaning even if you fail to discover the defect of the property, as improved or changed, your claim is forever barred if not brought within 12 years of the change. So, for example, if a builder puts in a drain system above your property, negligently, you have 12 years to sue from the date of the installation, even if you do not notice harm until year 11, giving you only one year to file suit.
Contact a Pittsburgh Landslide Lawyer Today!
Call Our Pittsburgh Lawyers any time for a free Consultation!
412.342.0992
