We moved to a townhouse and the sellers contracted the floor job to the Strata Co who in turn contracted out. The floor is coming apart at the joints and installer is claiming its due to cheap floor that the previous owners approved (basicaly they ane indirectly saying you got what was paid for).
They replaced some floor boards and will not do any more work even though its a very bad job.
Is there any way I can take the strata, the contractor and the previous owners to small claims court?
Any advise will helpful.
Thank you.
Did you get a proper invoice from them saying how long they warranty thier work for?
You could but it may cost you more in court costs and lawyer fees than to simply replace the floor with an independent contractor and have an actual warranty.
It might not be worth it to take them to small claims court. They probably have good lawyers working for them. You will end up spending more money than you probably want to. The money you will spend on a lawyer, you could probably hire a good contractor to fix or redo the job for you.
Your time and money would be better spent sourcing a reputable and referenced contractor to replace your flooring I would believe. Sorry if this is not what you want to hear and I hope all goes well for you on your project.
Unfortunately you are in a tight spot. This answer is going to be my opinion btw. I would recomend (depending on the amount of flooring) contacting your lawyer for a consult.
The blame is likely scattered everywhere in a scenario like this which makes it even harder to pin any responsibility to anybody.
The homeowner-could have picked a bad flooring. Cheap just to spruce up the sale of the house. Ive seen some "factory discount" suppliers selling floors they know will fail. But selling them at unbeatable prices. Doesn't necessarily make this the homeowners fault.
Strata: Well they oversaw the installation or if they made any money off of it they should have some realm of responsibility as well. Ensuring their subcontractors have proper installation methods-advising the homeowner of the poor qaulity. If they didn't do any of the above I would be talking to them again.
The installers: if they advised the homeowner that it was a poor floor qaulity that is one thing. Personally if I dont agree with the material and i know the homeowner is selling-Id walk away. If they are not selling..or I don't have the luxury to walk away; I would make them sign a document removing me from warranty. Doubtful that a flooring sub would produce such a contract..especially being brought in from a larger contractor.
So to sum things up. Small claims.. Your going to spend a lot of time and money to go through that process and have to try and pin the responsibility on one party and ultimately you have a slim chance of doing so as the blame is likely spread.
(Again this is me theorizing and my opinion.)
What would I do? I would make a fuss to everyone involved. Aim to get 30% of cost/profit back from each party.
A little bit from everybody can put you financialy a bit closer to replacing this floor. Other than that I would bite the bullet and move on, these things happen.
Best of luck,
Tom
Yes you could but most probably you will be wasting your time and your money. The practical way is to try to find a good guy that he could help you with fixing the floor with a reasonable price.
You have some pretty good advice here. Pinning blame on any one in particular person or company may prove fruitless. My suggestion is to appeal to the strata to deal with their contractor. They will have more authority as they hire the contractor.
Beyond that going through lawyers is a route that could be more expensive than it is worth. The contractor should want to have happy customers especially the strata as they could be providing lots of work.
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