House’s ex-owners, realtors subject of suit concerning rural property
Keith Fraser
Province
Joe Brown, 68, and Pauline Stone, 71, stand under one of many damp patches on their ceiling Thursday in Quesnel. The couple have been living in the house for two years. What should be a relaxing retirement has turned into a stressful legal battle due to there having been a marijuana grow-op in the house at one time. Photograph by: Susan Smith, for The Province
A retired couple who bought a rural Quesnel property are suing the former owners and the realtors who sold it to them because it had a former marijuana grow-op on the premises.
Pauline Stone and Joe Brown say that before their purchase of the property in August 2006 the vendors signed a property disclosure statement denying that the premises had been used as a grow-op or to manufacture illegal drugs.
They say the sellers knew or ought to have known that the representation was false and after they agreed to buy the property with a house and a barn, they informed the realtors they suspected the barn had been used as a grow-op.
The couple also believed there were material deficiencies with the buildings and the realtor agreed to rectify the problems if they completed the sale, says a statement of claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court.
The deficiencies have not been rectified and since the completion, the couple says they have suffered from residual chemical pollution and excessive mould and moisture.
“We started getting sick not too long after moving in,” said Stone, 71, a mother of two and grandmother of six. “Since we’ve been here we’ve been to the doctors more times than I care to think about with upper-respiratory infections and breathing difficulties.”
Added the 68-year-old Campbell: “We’ve been going through pretty horrible moments because this was our nest egg and we were going to be retired, no mortgage to pay. We’ve ended up in one awful mess.”
The couple are suing for general, special and aggravated damages.
Named as defendants are former owners Serena Douglas and Lynn Carole Douglas, realtors Dale Peter Yaffe and Christine Clayton, also known as Christine Yaffe, and Prism Realty Ltd., doing business as Royal LePage Prism Realty.
The Douglases could not be reached.
Christine Yaffe said her father-in-law, Dale Yaffe, handled the deal for the buyers while she acted for the sellers.
“They were the ones that actually stumbled onto the grow operation,” she said of the buyers. “I had never seen it. I had never heard of it.”
Dale Yaffe could not be reached.
In February last year, the Real Estate Council of B.C. issued a “consent order” finding that Dale Yaffe had committed professional misconduct in his handling of the sale and ordered him to pay $750 in enforcement expenses.
No statements of defence have been filed.
© Copyright (c) The Province
