Miami condo collapse

[jyl]

Interesting question is if the owners of the condo units are individually liable for damage and death caused by the collapse. They own the building and property, even if they relied on the association to manage it, and they made the decision to repair or not. I don’t know what FL law says. In CA there is a statute about this.

Potentially, the owners have not only suffered a total loss of the value of their unit whether collapsed or not, but also face a large personal liability.

[McLovin]

Depends on where the stairs were.

[McLovin]

The board members are officers of the association, a separate legal entity than the individual owners.
Seems like it would be very difficult to have condos if individual members are personally liable for the acts of the association or board.

[jyl]

Hmm, FL law might cap each owner's liability to the value of his or her unit (when? pre-collapse or post-collapse?).

http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0700-0799/0718/Sections/0718.119.html

"718.119 Limitation of liability.—

(1) The liability of the owner of a unit for common expenses is limited to the amounts for which he or she is assessed for common expenses from time to time in accordance with this chapter, the declaration, and bylaws.

(2) The owner of a unit may be personally liable for the acts or omissions of the association in relation to the use of the common elements, but only to the extent of his or her pro rata share of that liability in the same percentage as his or her interest in the common elements, and then in no case shall that liability exceed the value of his or her unit.

(3) In any legal action in which the association may be exposed to liability in excess of insurance coverage protecting it and the unit owners, the association shall give notice of the exposure within a reasonable time to all unit owners, and they shall have the right to intervene and defend."

Another reason not to own a condo. If the association doesn't carry sufficient insurance, or screws up and lets the insurance lapse, you're exposed to personal liability for the common areas. How many condo unit owners have any idea what insurance the association board carries?
I haven't spent more than 30 seconds reading the FL Condominium statutes though, so . . . http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0718/0718ContentsIndex.html

In CA, statute protects individual condo owners from liability if the association carries an (absurdly small) amount of insurance. https://findhoalaw.com/civil-code-section-5805-limitation-of-member-liability/

"(a) It is the intent of the Legislature to offer civil liability protection to owners of the separate interests in a common interest development that have common area owned in tenancy-in-common if the association carries a certain level of prescribed insurance that covers a cause of action in tort.

(b) Any cause of action in tort against any owner of a separate interest arising solely by reason of an ownership interest as a tenant-in-common in the common area of a common interest development shall be brought only against the association and not against the individual owners of the separate interests, if both of the insurance requirements in paragraphs (1) and (2) are met:

(1) The association maintained and has in effect for this cause of action, one or more policies of insurance that include coverage for general liability of the association.

(2) The coverage described in paragraph (1) is in the following minimum amounts:

(A) At least two million dollars ($2,000,000) if the common interest development consists of 100 or fewer separate interests.

(B) At least three million dollars ($3,000,000) if the common interest development consists of more than 100 separate interests."

[Mahler9th]

In CA, HOA Board members are indemnified provided that their actions and conduct meet requirements of the "business judgement rule."

HOA's carry D&O insurance for Board members.

But of course policies have exclusionary provisions and laws can be legally challenged depending on circumstances. I imagine whatever relevant laws exist in FL can likewise be challenged in specific circumstances.

[McLovin]

I wouldn’t own a condo either, but in FL that cap at least helps.
Although I’m in South Beach often and most of those high rises that have sprung up in the last 10-20 years can be unbelievably priced (look up some in the Porsche condo building, where you can park 11 cars INSIDE your 60th floor condo). $20 million condos.
But the majority aren’t like that.
Also I think if a claim were brought against an individual owner, that owners personal liability umbrella policy would cover it (but idk).

[URY914]

There will be new FL condo laws enacted because of this.

- Like a time limit that Boards must react to a building's survey.

- A hotline setup to report building irregulates to city or state inspectors.

- Inspectors will be much more critical of building's conditions and be held responsible for not acting on problems found.

[HobieMarty]

This is a very good explanation of what probably happened.

https://youtu.be/PEPyE2h6P4k

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[pmax]

Originally Posted by McLovin

The board members are officers of the association, a separate legal entity than the individual owners.
Seems like it would be very difficult to have condos if individual members are personally liable for the acts of the association or board.

HOAs are fun.

[jyl]

The California code is crazy. A 500 unit condo complex can be neglected and mismaintained by the owners, fall down and kill as many people as you want, and it only has to carry $3 million of insurance to give the owners immunity from liability for their collective refusal to make critical repairs. .

[craigster59]

This isn't good....

https://www.foxnews.com/us/surfside-condo-manager-repair-delays

[javadog]

Originally Posted by HobieMarty

This is a very good explanation of what probably happened.

https://youtu.be/PEPyE2h6P4k

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

I’m not sure that that guy is an engineer, as he seems to imply, but he’s pull together some interesting photos that I haven’t seen elsewhere, so the video is worth watching for that alone.

You’ve heard some engineers say in the past few days that they don’t think that this building collapse reflects a systemic problem with all buildings on that chunk of land but that it’s related to peculiarities of this particular building. The only thing that I can think of that might be what they are referring to is one of the things brought up in the video, the design of the ground level parking deck and the waterproofing related to it. Basically, the short version is that that level of the structure was poured flat, so that water tended to not drain from it properly. The assumption is that the waterproofing failed at some point and water pooled underneath it in certain areas for extended periods of time and caused deterioration of the rebar in the slab. I’m of the opinion that there was some differential settlement in the building and that the middle of the building settled more than other areas, which caused most of the deterioration to be in that area.

It’s clear that the ground level slab failed first and that might’ve had two effects on the columns. There would have been some parked cars in the lower level and so the collapse of the slab would have been onto the tops of those cars, which might have given rise to areas of the slab that fell further than others and came to rest in a sloping orientation. That might’ve put some lateral loads on the columns. Also, when the slab fell, it removed some lateral support for the columns, effectively making their unsupported length longer. On some of the smaller diameter columns, perhaps that exceeded their resistance to buckling. It’s also likely that there were some damaged columns, as I saw pictures of columns that had concrete spalled off of them, exposing the rebar inside. All of that, coupled with loads that were not as designed as a result of the differential settlement might be why this thing came down.

[HobieMarty]

This is an interesting one.

https://youtu.be/WJoTw4orM58

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[javadog]

I quit watching when he started talking about the post-tensioned concrete slabs that the building had, which of course, it didn’t. I might watch the rest of the video later, if I get time.

[HobieMarty]

Yeah, he later retracts that and verifies that what he was mistaking for cables was in fact rebar.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[jyl]

Really good video, thanks for posting it.

The video shot into the parking garage entrance, several minutes before the collapse, that he says may show a large fallen “beam” and water likely pouring from a broken pipe, roughly in the center of the first parking level and where the pooled water reported by the pool contractor was, is interesting.

Does it suggest that the slab failed at that point, and over the next several minutes more of the slab failed until the collapse started?

[HobieMarty]

https://youtu.be/TrP-Zl7NHzE

That building had a lot of exposed rebar. You can actually go to the street view on Google Earth and see it. I find it strange though that the exposed rebar in the balconies seems to only be on the street side of the building. I didn't see any exposed stuff on the beach side, wierd, you would think the beach side would have more wear and tear on it that the street side.


Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[javadog]

I can’t tell with any certainty what I see on the floor in the video, and I haven’t gone back to look at the drawings to see what was in that area. I am pretty certain that that’s where the problem started, though.

[javadog]

Originally Posted by HobieMarty

Yeah, he later retracts that and verifies that what he was mistaking for cables was in fact rebar.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

Yeah but if he really knew what he was looking at, it should have been obvious from any of the picture of what's left. Or, a cursory glance at the drawings...

If I was going to go to the trouble of making a YouTube video about it, I'd probably do a little homework...

[javadog]

I'd like to get a hi res photo of this area, circled in red.