No one disclosed faulty furnace pilot light
Q. We bought our first home last month. It was built in 1948 and has a very old heating system. Our home inspector advised having the gas company check the furnace to make sure it was safe. The gas company said it was working fine. When we moved in, the gas service was turned off. When the gas man turned it back on, he was unable to light the furnace pilot because of a faulty control valve. We filed a claim with the home warranty company. Their repairman said the repair was not covered because the defect was a pre-existing condition. He also said that "someone tried to fix the valve and made a mess down there." The neighbor said the previous owner had trouble lighting the pilot. Shouldn't he have listed this in his disclosure form? Now that we own the property, who is responsible for the cost of repairing or replacing this furnace?
A. It appears the seller was negligent in his disclosures. According to the neighbor, the seller had trouble lighting the pilot on the furnace. According to the warranty repairman, someone performed makeshift repairs on the faulty control valve. Yet nothing was said about the furnace in the seller's disclosure statement.
If the seller had forgotten to mention the furnace problem, the visit by the gas company should have reminded him of the troublesome pilot.
The findings of the warranty repairman also raise questions about the thoroughness of the home inspection. According to the repairman's statement, someone "made a mess down there." Whatever that mess was, it would seem to have been an observable condition that was out of the ordinary. The inspector did recommend evaluation by the gas company, but not for any specific defect. If he had noticed a "mess" at the control valve, the appropriate recommendation would have been "evaluation by a licensed HVAC contractor," not the gas company.
In light of these circumstances, you should notify the seller and your home inspector of this pre-existing condition and insist that either or both of them take some responsibility for this undisclosed defect. The first order of liability, however, should be focused upon the seller.
Q. In one of your columns, you said the minimum size for a bedroom is 70 square feet. That seems extremely small. How many people can legally occupy a room of that size?
A. The building code does not specify how many people can occupy a small bedroom. The authors of the code probably relied on people's common sense in that regard. However, if you gathered an assembly of slender people, standing side-by-side with their arms extended over their heads, you could probably pack in 60+ participants, but not comfortably. In the event of a fire, vacating the room in a timely manner could be problematic.
• To write to Barry Stone, visit him on the web at www.housedetective.com, or write AMG, 1776 Jami Lee Court, Suite 218, San Luis Obispo, CA 94301.
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