All Forum Posts by: Tony Nguyen

Hello,


I am abbreviating a lot of the details here for conciseness.  The asbestos was found to be positive.  The abatement company was certified, but they still did a poor job.  The post abatement report was negative, and from what I understand that PCM test is a general test used to determine habitability, but there are more specific ones out there that are typically done in industrial settings.

My question here has to do with liability.  Is the tenant responsible for the damages, as he caused them?  Or is the landlord liable for not disclosing the presence of asbestos, even though it was not known?

thank you.

Hello,

I have a peculiar situation here. I own a SFH that has been a rental for 16 years. When the tenant moved in, he bumped into some ductwork made of asbestos. This caused the material to come apart and he wanted to have it removed asap.

I complied with his request and used a vendor that he was familiar with.  My tenant is also a contractor.  He states the vendor did a poor job at containing all the asbestos when they were doing the abatement and a lot of his belongings got contaminated as well.  He did not move his belongings away from where the abatement was happening, it sounded like.  He has since moved out, and I agreed to pay for the month’s rent and some of his hotel lodging while he was out.  The house was tested by a certified company and was not found to have asbestos by air sampling.


My question is how much responsibility is each party liable for here?  I know that the landlord technically should disclose the presence of asbestos.  However, I wasn’t aware of this.  The tenant who initially caused this damage - I would think should be responsible for some of the material damage that occurred, as he caused it?

thank you,

Tony