20 Million Dollar Verdict

Why would the MC be responsible? They are a paid contractor to the HOA. They do not own or maintain that playground equipment. The HOA does. The HOA didn't do it's due diligence to maintain it safely. Thus they are on the hook for it. The MC could had screamed from the roof tops the playground equipment was bad. It still the HOA decision to spend the money.

Now if they actually get 20 million dollars is yet to be determined. Most of the time, these type of multi-million suits get reduced down or doesn't come out to 20 million. There's more to the settlement after insurance and a few more legal meetings.

Our HOA some people wanted a playground. I asked the insurance company directly about it. They too advised that it would not make any difference having it or not. We already had a pool. So I'd go straight to the source and not the MC.

A few years ago I looked into purchasing our own playground equipment. Found that you have to be careful what you purchase for "commercial/public" use. Those playgrounds that you can buy at Lowes or catalogs... READ the FINE print! Found out the warranty would not have covered use in a HOA/public use type area. The warranty is for private homeowner use. So it's not necessarily the liability but the replacement costs as well. The HOA voted down having a playground.

This case was mentioned on a local HOA website here -> LINK <-. Apparently 2 other swing sets were previously repaired and then the HOA opted out of a safety and inspection plan offered by the swing set’s installer.

Saw that in print.
75 cents per homeowner per year. That is what it would have cost to perform an annual safety inspection. Instead of blowing a wad of cash on landscaping, they should have scaled back by $200.00 IDIOT BOD's all the BOD's should lose their homes.

This it the same HOA that was fighting a developer from taking a privately owned park and developing apartments, which has been green lighted.

I'm guessing that concerned homeowners are going to be calling for a recall election, and some new BOD's will be installed.
FOX5 had a camera crew at the scheduled HOA meeting, but the meeting was abruptly cancelled. The BOD's feeeweeengs was hurt by the FOX 5 news coverage.

Wonder what happened to warrant a $20 million judgment?

Your management company can provide a lot of valuable information and sometimes they do know the correct answer to some legal questions but remember they aren't attorneys or your insurance company. If you have questions about liability, don't be cheap or lazy - go to people who are qualified (or at least have more experience with such issues).

I'm sure heads will roll across town, but as for as your community is concerned, you might want to start an annual inspection of the pool and playground equipment, as Tim suggested. You may even want to consider if you got the right type of playground equipment - when we replaced ours, our president at the time did some digging and found the one we had WAS NOT up to Consumer Protection Safety Commission standards. Like many HOAs, it was thought getting one of those sets you see at a home improvement store would suffice, but those are actually designed for use in one's backyard and aren't sturdy enough for all the wear and tear a bunch of neighborhood kids might cause. There are also requirements about the size of the lot the equipment sits on, and a lot of other things we never dreamed of.

In the end, we found a commercial playground dealer (I think our president ended up calling the city parks department for a referral) and they came out and measures and we paid $5000 for the thing. That didn't make sense to some of our homeowners until we explained what was required and didn't want the association to get sued if a kid wound up getting hurt. They piped down. Granted, the set doesn't have all the bells and whistles you normally see (because people get sued if a kid gets on a swing set and falls out and that sort of thing), but little kids like playing on it and that's what we cared about. We figured the bigger kids would be playing football or double dutch anyway - if they couldn't find room around the community the parents could always take them down the street to the local park (we're a townhouse community originally designed for adults so it isn't easy)

This article goes into a little more detail:

https://www.ktnv.com/news/contact-13/hoa-hit-with-20m-verdict-over-swing-set-negligence

I had loss assessment coverage added to my homeowner's insurance policy to help in case of special assessments that are needed to cover stuff like this.

Sorry for the young man - we replaced our playground sets precisely because we were concerned about accidents like this and subsequent liability. The older ones weren't CPSC compliant anyway (thank God no one got hurt) and when we took a closer look, we found some parts were loose, some were rusted and the ground the equipment sat on had various glass shards and other stuff that could poke holes in little kids and adults. We'd also had issues with older kids who tore off the swings because they wanted the chains they hung from to use as weapons.

Today, our set is basically a jungle gym designed for very young children and it sits on rubber mulch, which should cushion any falls. It's not something bigger kids can climb on at all - and we have a bench nearby so people can sit and watch what's going on. When we installed it, a newsletter article warned if there was any misuse or abuse of the equipment, the Board would tear it down and it would not be replaced. Knock on wood, that seems to have prevented a certain amount of drama.

To other HOA board members - THIS is why preventative maintenance is important. You and/or the homeowners might squawk at spending the money, but 99% of the time, preventative maintenance will help you discover problems that are relatively easy and inexpensive to fix. Better that than coughing up $20 million down the road because someone didn't take the time to have a look at the playground equipment, roofing, balcony railings, etc.

I have that in my homeowner insurance coverage. Essentially if the HOA is sued (not by yourself) and then on the hook for any lawsuit then your insurance will cover you for X amount that you have coverage for to cover your share of potential legal costs and/or any other claims. It is not expensive and worth its weight in not having to worry about stupid BS.

In my last relocation I specifically looked for an HOA with no amenities due to the cost and liability of such. I know many look for associations with amenities. All well and good but learn from this to cover yourself. Even if one covered them self, there will be those that will avoid and association with legal issues so be proactive and be sure the association is covered.

I also purchased my retirement home in an HOA with zero amenities.
$50 per year is all we pay.