SELMA P. GRIFFIN v. MUNFORD DEVELOPMENT COMPANY AND CHARLES WALKER (Tenn.Ct.App. March 6, 2008).
This case involves the statute of repose for actions based on improvements to real property. The defendant developer purchased and developed a lot for sale as part of a residential development. The plaintiff purchased the lot by warranty deed. The developer represented to the plaintiff that the lot was suitable for the construction of a residential dwelling. Relying on this representation, the plaintiff purchased the lot and built a house on it. Two years after the purchase, the house began to develop cracks in the foundation and exterior walls. Over the next two years, the problems worsened, so the plaintiff obtained an evaluation by professional engineers. The engineers informed the plaintiff that the house's structural problems may have arisen because the soil on which the house was built was unsuitable to support such construction.
The plaintiff then sued the development company and its president, claiming fraudulent misrepresentation, breach of implied warranty, and breach of express warranty. The defendants moved for summary judgment, asserting that the four-year statute of repose on claims involving improvements to real property barred the plaintiff's action. The plaintiff argued that the statute of repose was not applicable because her claims were based on misrepresentation. The trial court granted the defendants' motion, and the plaintiff appeals. We affirm, finding that the plaintiff failed to introduce evidence that any of the defendants had knowledge that the soil conditions were unsuitable to support a residential dwelling at the time the alleged misrepresentations were made.
Opinion available at the Tennessee Bar Association website:
http://www.tba2.org/tba_files/TCA/2008/griffins_030608.pdf
"In their statement of undisputed facts, the Defendants noted that Munford Development sold Lot 414 to Griffin on June 5, 2001; that Griffin began seeing cracks and other defects in the walls, floors, and foundation of her house in 2003; and that Griffin’s complaint was not filed until October 3, 2005. In light of these facts, the Defendants argued that the four-year statute of repose, set forth in Tennessee Code Annotated § 28-3-202, barred Griffin’s action. In Griffin’s response to the Defendants’ motion for summary judgment, she argued that because the Defendants had engaged in fraud, Tennessee Code Annotated § 28-3-205 precluded them from relying on section 28-3-202." Id.
"In Griffin’s response to the Defendants’ motion for summary judgment, on the issue of the Defendants’ knowledge, Griffin did not point to overlooked evidence, produce additional evidence, or request additional time for discovery. We have only Griffin’s evidence of the unsuitable soil conditions and her bare assertions regarding the Defendants’ knowledge and intent. Under these circumstances, we must find that Griffin failed to carry her burden to articulate specific facts showing that Defendants Walker and Munford Development had sufficient knowledge to support a finding by the trier of fact that their alleged misrepresentation about the suitability of the soil for construction was either intentional or reckless. Accordingly, Griffin cannot rely on Tennessee Code Annotated § 28-3-205(b), and the trial court properly concluded that the four-year statute of repose is applicable to Griffin’s cause of action." Id.
