Guest: Okay. I have a question. I haven’t been vacation rental up north and two years ago I had a guest of my renter all down my stairs and she is suing me. My insurance company denied liability because we said there was nothing wrong with the stairs and there was a hand rail. Okay. So I don’t know if that suit was dropped, but now my, my property manager just got served with papers. Now they’re trying to throw her, cause she manages the property. Can they do that?
Justin: Well, yeah. I mean you can sue anybody you want, but um, yeah, I think it’s going to be a tough case. I don’t know what, what liability and property manager would have. I mean you have to show there’s some sort of defective condition with that, with the property, right, mark?
Mark: Yeah, we have, if there’s been a, an actual legal adjudication that the stairs were fine and that’s where the injury was, then I really can’t imagine how you could then sue a property manager. That seems pretty difficult.
Justin: I mean, they already sued once and failed. So, uh, I tell him it’s going to be tough, but obviously the property manager needs to get their attorney and fight the lawsuit because that’s out there.
Mark: But uh, that’s not your job. The property managers should have their own insurance and they should be taken care of it.
Justin: They’re not asking you to do anything, are they?
Guest: No, but they also their knee on the booth. But I didn’t get served. She did. But my name is on there too. I gave it, I gave it back to my insurance company and they said they would take care of that.
Justin: Perfect. So sounds-
Guest: have an adjuster come out, took pictures of the stairs and all that. And that’s how they decided I wasn’t liable. So I don’t know. You know what happens now?
Justin: Well, I mean it sounds like just the insurance got me said you’re not liable and denied it, which is their, their opinion. And you know, obviously the person who fell has a different opinion, but um, you’ve done everything the the exact correct way. You turn it over to your insurance company, let them deal with it. And I wouldn’t worry about it.
Guest: Ah, okay. Thank you so much
Justin: All right. You have a good day. We’re gonna keep answering all of your legal questions and mark that’s, uh, that that’s what you gotta do if you get sued. I mean, have the insurance and be able to turn it over to them, right?
Mark: ah exactly. And you can, you know, if there was a problem with this stairway, as we’ve discussed almost every episode you can, um, as a landlord, you have to be very careful and, or if you get injured on a property that’s owned by a landlord, the liability is, is, is considerably larger than it is if you’re just at a Walmart,
New Speaker: you’d be at a higher duty. You have a duty to, to the tenants to, to keep that property in good condition. But I don’t know, unless there’s something wrong with those stairs, I don’t know how that lawsuit is going to go, but, you know, not her problem. I wouldn’t worry about it. Turn over the insurance company and let them deal with it.