By Angela Mack
OCEAN ISLE BEACH | The brick home that sits at 1772 Salt Marsh Circle looks like it came from the pages of a magazine.
Actually, it did.
Wilmington native Chris Gilbert got the blueprint for the 4,000-square-foot dream house from a home and garden publication.
But hiring Kinston-based Ross-Markham Inc. to custom build the $500,000 home has become the biggest mistake of his life.
A
report released Tuesday by the N.C. Public Interest Research Group,
highlights the Gilberts’ story and that of others who have fallen
victim to faulty construction by builders statewide.
In
2001, Gilbert hired Ross-Markham to build his home after meeting a
contractor recently hired by the company, which was constructing a
savings and loan building in the area.
“We checked on the Internet. He had no complaints on his license,” Gilbert said. “We figured it might be all right.”
One
day while walking around the construction site, Gilbert noticed the
downstairs ceilings were two feet higher than what was listed on the
plans and part of the staircase leading to the second floor was missing.
During
a framing inspection and a final inspection, Brunswick County Inspector
Wilbur Vereen didn’t cite any violations and issued a certificate of
occupancy.
A
complaint against Vereen was filed with the N.C. Code Officials
Qualification Board. When an investigator was sent to the home, 31 code
violations were found.
A set of temporary stairs made of untreated wood is still attached to the back door.
The roof isn’t fastened to the house properly, and hurricane clasps are missing.
The wall height violated the building code by a foot and in one place by more than 10 feet.
Gilbert
hired two engineers to survey the home and was told the building
materials were misused. The family was encouraged to evacuate the home
if winds ever reach more than 60 mph because the roof would likely
collapse.
The
Gilberts filed a lawsuit in Brunswick County Superior Court against
Ross-Markham and general contractor Robert Deaver, Brunswick County,
and building inspectors Vereen, Delaney Aycock and Tony Wicker
According
to a January 2006 court document obtained by the Star-News, County
Attorney Huey Marshall testified that the Gilberts’ property damage
claims were not submitted while the county was under a “claims made”
insurance policy. Once that policy was terminated, the county replaced
it with an “occurrence” policy that limits coverage to incidents
occurring during the policy period. The county also had professional
liability coverage that lasted from July 2002 to July 2004.
The Gilberts did not make their claim against the county until November 2004, Marshall said.
Even
though the county had these policies in place, the lawsuit is barred by
the sovereign immunity doctrine because none of the policies provide
coverage for “property damage, loss to property, and loss of use of
property,” the court documents stated. Sovereign immunity means a
governmental body is protected from a civil suit or criminal
prosecution.
“There’s
no insurance for that,” Marshall said Monday about property damage
coverage for the county. “We have tried to get it. It’s not offered.”
The Gilberts’ case was dismissed. A lawsuit filed against the builder is pending.
Vereen’s
license has been suspended for two years by the state because of gross
negligence and gross incompetence. Ross-Markham has gone bankrupt,
according to the report.
Thompson
said more stringent policies are needed to streamline building
practices, but county governments should also take responsibility when
inspectors fail to do their jobs and allow defective homes to be built.
“When they don’t do that, they’re not protecting the public,” he said.
Local
real estate attorney Chris Behm said he handles between 50 to 100
faulty construction claims a year that occur throughout Southeastern
North Carolina.
With some clients, the problems are worked out before the house is completed, he said. Another 25 to 50 claims end up in court.
A
spokeswoman for the N.C. Office of State Fire Marshal, which oversees
the N.C. Code Officials Qualification Board, said investigators handle
about 25 formal complaints each year statewide that are related to
building inspection problems.
Kristin
Runger said that when consumers make complaints, an investigator tries
to resolve the issue before it becomes a more serious problem. If it
cannot be resolved, a formal complaint is filed and an investigation is
launched.
Right now, four ongoing formal complaint investigations are being handled in eastern North Carolina.
Behm
said he has seen cases where builders have downloaded contracts from
the Internet and given them to a potential homebuyer to sign without
changing any wording.
“A
contract may read ‘subject to California law,’ ” Behm said. He said out
of every 10 clients he works with only one has a building contract
reviewed by an attorney before signing it. Contractors often insert
clauses in their contracts that waive a consumer warranty, leaving the
homebuyer with less coverage and no way to recover from losses.
The
costs of having a contract reviewed can range from a couple of hundred
dollars to a few thousand dollars, Behm said. “It depends on how
involved people want you to be,” he said.
In
2005, the N.C. Attorney General’s office received nearly 900 consumer
complaints related to home repair and construction, including shoddy
work, work that was never performed and contractors abandoning jobs.
This issue ranked No.
8 on the Top 10 list of consumer complaints for the year.
Contractors do not need a license for work that costs less than $30,000.
In
the case of the Gilberts, their home is now valued at $137,000. They
paid $200,000 out of their own pocket to have the home built and have
spent about $30,000) in legal fees trying to get it repaired. It will
cost an estimated $365,000 to repair the home’s roof.
A 1982 shooting at Chris Gilbert’s GTE office in California left him disabled after being hit eight times. He is unable to work.
“The sad thing is life still goes on through all of this,” Luanne Gilbert said.
The
couple’s children – Savannah, 7, and Nathan, 8 – now sleep in bunk beds
in a downstairs office. Sloping floors and incorrectly built windows
and ceilings are visibly noticeable in their bedrooms upstairs.
A
neon yellow Post-it note reading “Do not use” hangs from the
second-floor bathroom shower. Someone over 5 feet 1 inch is unable to
stand in the stall without hitting his head on the ceiling. You won’t
see your face in vanity mirrors, which were installed too low because
of inaccurate ceiling patterns.
“I feel like I’ve arrived in Disneyland and I’m looking in the fun mirrors,” Chris Gilbert said.
The
couple has had to dip into their savings account and children’s college
funds to pay legal expenses, and when Luanne Gilbert’s father died last
year they couldn’t afford to send the entire family to the funeral.
“We might lose what we have, but maybe we’ll save someone else,” Chris Gilbert said.
He said an engineer suggested that the county buy the home from the Gilberts and use it as a training facility for inspectors.
“If
they don’t catch the violations, they shouldn’t get their license,”
Gilbert said. “We’re just disappointed in the county government. When
they issue a certificate of occupancy the house should be safe.”
