Condo Media - April 2021 - 39

To anyone thinking of buying developer rights: do your homework,
find out exactly what is wrong with the old units before you commit to
buying the rights to build new units in any given project.
R.I. STATUTE GUIDANCE
To be sure, provisions of the Rhode
Island Condominium Act, including
RIGL 34- 36.1- 3.04, exist to protect the
successor declarant from the cause of
anger mentioned above, that is, the errors, omissions, and otherwise unfulfilled
promises of the original declarant. Specifically, 3.04 (b) of that statute states:
" A transferor (here, that would be our
Sally) is not relieved of any obligation
or liability arising before the transfer
and remains liable for warranty obligations imposed upon him or her by this
chapter (here, the RI Condo Law)... " So
this means that Sally is still responsible
for what she did or did not do that is
causing the unit owners' anger. Harry
did not cause the anger. Rather, though
the problems were caused by Sally,
Harry is in effect paying for the anger

caused by someone else. Unfortunately,
Harry is not in a good situation. He is not
required to fix Sally's problems, but if he
does not, the unit owners will continue
to harass him and his future buyers.
The obvious course of action would
be to have the unit owners require Sally
to fix the problems. Harry might have
to get involved formally. For instance,
he might consider commencing formal
legal proceedings against Sally on the
theory that her failed promises and the
ensuing unit owner anger, is in effect
causing him to lose profits on the sales
of his new units. That might be difficult
and expensive. There is no easy answer
here for Harry, but perhaps it might
make sense for him to meet with the
existing unit owners, assure them that
he will try to get the original declarant
to fix the problems. That might help as-

suage the anger he purchased along
with the rights to fully build out this
condominium project.
So then the moral here is that
Harry, our successor declarant, does
in almost every situation purchase the
unit owners' anger over the original
declarant's failed promises. It would
accordingly behoove Harry next time
to do a better job of surveilling or
investigating what if any problems
exist with this project before meeting
with Sally, the original declarant, and
purchasing her problems and along
with it, the unit owners' anger.
■ FRANK A. LOMBARDI, ESQ.,
CCAL IS A PARTNER IN
LOMBARDI LAW GROUP.

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April 2021 CONDOMEDIA

Condo Media - April 2021

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