■ A home inspector, a real estate agent, a seller and a buyer all share responsibility for the complaints of Marlene Ranta, a first-time buyer of a Montana Avenue townhouse.
Judge Pro Tem Norman Axe awarded Ranta $3,750 for damages to the townhome she said occurred before she moved in last summer. Axe distributed responsibility evenly between Rantra and the three defendants, who will each have to pay $1,250 toward the $5,000 claim, which is the maximum that can be collected in small claims court.
Ranta claimed that her agent, her inspector and the seller of the Santa Monica home all failed to disclose several odorous patches of cat urine in the carpet and underneath the sub-flooring. She also claimed there were pre-existing leaks under every sink and other areas of general disrepair. She told the court she spent more than $10,000 in repairs.
“I’ve been through hell and back with this one,” Ranta said. “It’s been terrible. Everything had like a domino effect: It was non-stop.”
After several unsuccessful meetings and phone calls, Ranta brought the case against Coldwell Banker agent Orchid Griffin, Robert Gaudveault of La Rocca Inspection Systems, and Robert Peeples, the seller of the property.
“I really felt like I would be protected by the people I hired. These are professional people, each of them received a sizable amount of money to protect me — and they didn’t,” Ranta said.
Axe said although Ranta hired people to protect her investment, she should have been more alert to pre-existing problems.
“It’s tough to realize what everyone was really doing,” Axe said. “I try to use common sense. One of the things you’re trying here is negligence. Looking at this situation, I know you’re not a pro, but you’re a person, you have eyes. You could have seen some of these (problems with the property).”
Still, Axe scolded the agent, inspector and seller for not working together to fully inform Ranta.
“Everyone has an expertise and she went to the professionals for help,” Axe said. The defendants all claimed they had performed their jobs thoroughly, each spending a great deal of time with Ranta and on the property before and during escrow.
They alleged that Ranta couldn’t be satisfied. “The plaintiff wanted a new house,” Peeples said. But Axe didn’t buy it. After entering judgment, he compared the defendants’ behavior to rifts between two government agencies.
“The FBI and the CIA won’t talk to each other because one handles domestic issues, the other international. They each have their own bailiwick. So what happens? Guy gets on a plane, flies into a building, 9/11 happens.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 10, 2002. Read the original PDF.