Lopsided house like being on a boat, says couple

Update added January, 2023: 

When this case was due to resume, High Court president Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns was told the matter had been settled and could be struck out.

Original report:

An estate agent invited by a couple to look at their three-year-old home with a view to selling it asked for a ball to roll across the floor because he suspected the house was lopsided, the High Court has heard.

The agent turned out to be correct and the house at the Sallows, Letterbarrow, Co Donegal, owned by parents of five Karen and Francis Carr, was never put up for sale.

“People who visit the house say they are sick when they are in it, that it is like being on a boat,” Mrs Carr told the court yesterday.

The Carrs have sued engineer Gerard Duke, claiming he failed to spot the foundation of their house had been defectively laid, resulting in the lopsidedness.

Mr Duke, of Duke Associates, consulting engineers, Donegal town, denies the claim. He says he was not employed in a day-to-day supervisory capacity but only on the basis of periodic inspections, seven of which were carried out at €140 each.

The Carrs say Mr Dukes was negligent and in breach of duty by failing to inspect the foundations or remedy the defects.

They say they were left with a €100,000 mortgage for a house now valued at €30,000, but which is in fact unsaleable to someone needing a mortgage to buy it. Their auctioneer said it is liveable, not dangerous.

In 2007, the Carrs consulted an estate agent about selling the house, build about three years earlier, as they wanted to live nearer the facilities of Donegal Town.

But when the agent called, he asked Mrs Carr if she had a ball or orange to roll across the floor. When this was done, it confirmed to the agent the house was lopsided, Luán O Braonáin, for the Carrs, said.

Under cross-examination by Gary Fitzgerald, Mrs Carr said she had noticed a problem with the doors closing before the estate agent pointed out the problem, but did not believe there was anything wrong with the house because “we had done everything right” and got certification.

The hearing continues.