Man gets what he wanted: Floor repair
By Barbara Arntsen
Published in News on September 2, 2004 2:00 PM
A Wayne County man plagued with a sagging floor in his mobile home has dropped his lawsuit against Quality Homes, because his floor was finally repaired.
James Potter said that Horton Homes, the manufacturer of the mobile home, came to his home on Tuesday and repaired the defective floor. New linoleum was also placed on the entire floor.
"I'm satisfied," Potter said. "Horton Homes is the one that finally fixed it."
Potter's mobile home off of Black Jack Church Road was a replacement for the one he owned when Hurricane Floyd ripped through Wayne County in 1999. It was bought with state and federal money as part of the "repair and replacement" program.
All Potter had to do was keep up the taxes and homeowner's insurance policy, which he says he has done. He also must live in the home for at least 10 years as part of the buyout program.
Potter noticed that the floor leading from his kitchen was sagging underneath him about two years ago and called Quality Homes to come repair the floor. The mobile home was manufactured by Horton Homes. Quality Homes was the dealer Potter bought the home from.
Potter said that workers from Quality Homes came out three times in the past year to fix the floor, but nothing worked. He said his insurance wouldn't cover the sagging floor, because the insurance company said it was a defect in the mobile home.
Potter first filed a claim against Sherwood Daly, owner of Quality Homes, but was told by Magistrate Allen Jones that he would need to refile that claim naming Quality Homes as well.
Potter refiled the claim and said that within a week he was contacted by representatives from Horton Homes.
The mobile home manufacturer sent a crew from Anderson, S.C., to repair Potter's floor on Aug. 11.
"They cut a 25-inch hole in the floor and put some wood down and pulled the linoleum back over it," Potter said. "They said it wasn't damaged because of a trailer defect, but that the damage was caused because it had been exposed to moisture."
Potter maintained that the area was exposed to moisture because Quality Homes did not repair the problem correctly.
Daly, Quality Homes owner, said that the flooring was not resting on a stud, and that was what had caused the floor to sag.
"I don't deny there was a problem," Daly said. "We sent someone out to repair it because we were trying to remedy a problem."
Daly said he thought the problem had been fixed and didn't know that it wasn't fixed until Potter filed a claim against him.
The claim was denied last week by Magistrate Sandra Castle who said that Potter had not proved Quality Homes was responsible for the damage to the mobile home.
Potter filed an appeal last week in District Court to the ruling, saying he wanted his floor fixed properly.
He withdrew the appeal Wednesday because his floor was finally fixed.
"That's all I ever wanted, and I thank Horton Homes for fixing it," he said.