real estate question, legal issues.......?

Question

My mother sold her house 2 years ago. The first time she tried to sell it 3 years proir she had it inspected and nothing was found, she was even offering a warranty at that time. She had major construction done, but it was all in the basement that she made into an extra luxury unit. The current owners have found water damage in one of the upstairs units and have had to do major repairs because of this. They want her to pay for all the repair costs and costs for energy since they found wires that were done wrong,which were not messed with while we were there, (the basement was only worked on). She is currently going to arbitration under their requests. She's been billed 490 dollars for this so far.
My question is, who should be responsible for all the damage costs? The current owners did not have it inspected before they moved in, and my mother had it inspected 3 years prior with everything fine.

Answer 1

In Texas the question would be if it looked like she knew about this damage at the time of closing.

The buyer could sue for triple damages if they could show the seller knew and hid the damage and that they suffered loss because of it.

If the laws are the same where you are, and if your Mother knew nothing about this damage, then your Mother might be paying to help the buyer out so she doesn't have to go to court to argue her case.

Answer 2

Hopefully she has a copy of the inspection from 3 years ago.

If she knew there was water problems when she had the construction done and didn't disclose this, the buyer's have a case. If she didn't know and they did not do the buyer's due diligence to have their own inspections done before purchasing the property, your mother has no obigations here.

It is a litigation based society, there is always someone trying to make somebody else responsible for what happens. Maybe Mother Nature will get named in this action for producing the rain.

Answer 3

The current owners of the property are responsible for all these costs. She has no obligation to these people. They bought the house 'as is'. Why is she going to arbitration ? Did they sue her ?