Who Is Responsible For Condo Sewer Line Repair

Sewage Backup in Condominium

This case involves a couple who owned a condominium. The couple used the condo equally a vacation abode. They experienced several sewage backups in their unit where they establish toilet leaks, sewage residual in their kitchen sink and in the sink and tub in the main bedroom. The couple had 6 sewage backups inside a 5-year period, which allegedly caused them extreme distress and extensive costs as they attempted to waterproof as some of the valuable stored items in the condo. They informed the condominium management about the backups and the management visitor claimed it was not their responsibility to hire a plumber or investigate the issue. The couple hired a plumber to snake the PEX pipage bleed line in the condo. Two of the couple's neighbors too had sewage backups in their units. The plumber recommended annual maintenance of the bleed lines serving the building.

Question(south) For Expert Witness

1. What could crusade repeated sewage backups in a condominium?

Expert Witness Response

In many cases like this one, the condo involved is located on the beginning floor of a multi-story building with an hush-hush parking garage. Each ground floor unit usually shares vertical drain pipes with the units stacked above. The vertical drain pipes will run through the shared common area walls and connect to lateral drain pipes running below the units and along the ceiling of the undercover garage. To preclude sewage backups, the condo clan direction is usually responsible for arranging for maintenance of the main plumbing line. This commonly involves hiring a plumber to "hydro-jet" the main line by blasting the lines with a high-pressure level stream of water. In most cases, a blockage of 1 of the main sewer lines serving the condo unit where a sewage backup has taken place and the units stacked higher up it may crusade repeated sewage backups. This blazon of blockage can occur in a lateral drain line running through the parking garage beneath the stacked units. Since this blazon of sewage backup occurred in a mutual area, the condo association is usually required to pay for the plumbing repair costs. In cases like this ane, it is usually debris that has accumulated over many years that causes a blockage in the main lines and the condo association is responsible for hiring a plumber to clean the pipes properly to repair the blockage.

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