Homeowner sold a R2.3m dud

MOLATELO Maloka thought she had bought a dream home, but what she found was a damp, smelly house with sagging cupboards and bubbling and cracking paint.

The new owner turned to court to get a reduction on the selling price of the house, as well as to force them to cough up for fixing the damp problem.

The sellers claimed they were not aware of these problems when they sold the house. The property was in any event sold voetstoots to the plaintiff. Thus, they argued, they were protected by the voetstoots clause against latent defects which were unknown to the seller.

The North Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, however, found that as it had been found that the latent defects were known to the defendants, they could not be protected by the voetstoots clause in the offer to purchase.

Maloka told the court that when she saw the Roodepoort house for sale, she went to look at it and decided to buy it for R2.3 million.

It was only after moving in that she discovered the damp problems, which were never disclosed to her.

These included damp on the floors of the main bedroom and two guest bedrooms, rising and lateral damp on all walls permeating through the property, including the main bedroom, kitchen, dining room, study and spare bedrooms. Maloka said the sellers, Nicholas and Hesta Vermeulen, had a duty to inform her about this.

She testified that she walked around the property when she viewed it for the first time and the estate agent told her that the property had recently been renovated and painted and, in particular, that work had been done in the kitchen. Maloka said that she did take notice of some bubbling and peeling of paint in the main bedroom. She asked the Vermeulens if there were any waterproofing problems and they answered in the negative. However, he said that if she wanted to buy the house, he would have it repaired.

The plaintiff confirmed that she did not notice any other unusual features in the house. Before the transfer of the property was effected, she visited the house with her father. She noticed that the damp she had taken note of in the main bedroom on the previous visit had been repaired. However, the texture of the wall where it had been repaired had been smoothed over. When she eventually moved in, she did not notice anything untoward.

She went to Polokwane for the holidays the next day. On her return, she experienced an overwhelming sense of damp. When she started packing her belongings, she noticed that the smell was everywhere and also that there was some discolouration of the carpets. The shelving in the kitchen was sunken and some of her belongings had mould on them.

She testified that she had not at any stage looked into the cupboards in the property before she took occupation and when she viewed the property as she felt that this would have been an invasion of the sellers’ privacy.

Maloka continued living in the property and noticed more problems associated with damp on the property.

She did notify the estate agent and decided to get legal advice.

Vermeulen described the house which he had sold as a dream home. However, he said sometime after heavy rain, water trickled down the study wall. That was the first encounter with any sort of problem with the house. A roof specialist had been contacted whereupon it was stripped and dampproofed over the parapet walls on the outside. The problem never occurred again. According to Vermeulen, they did refurbishments over the years and fixed the damp and a few cracks. He denied that Maloka had asked him anything about damp problems or that he or his wife had deliberately concealed any defects from the plaintiff.

Judge Selemeng Mokose, however, ordered the Vermeulens to pay Maloka R414 787.77, the price quoted by a contractor to fix the problems.