Woman seeks $100,000 from home builder

CHARLESTON - A Kanawha County woman seeks $100,000 from a home building company for damages caused by building mistakes.

Lou Ann Weisburg filed a suit May 11 in Kanawha Circuit Court against Ideal Homes and CMH Homes Inc. Ideal Homes is the seller of the manufactured home, whose license was revoked by the state in August 2006, the suit says.

Bernard Grose, the president of Ideal, also is named as a defendant in the suit.

According to the lawsuit, Weisburg entered into a contract on Oct. 20, 2004, that stated Ideal would furnish all materials and labor to construct a home produced by CMH, for $125,305.

On May 15, 2005, Weisburg moved into the home and discovered it contained a substantial number of defects in structure and workmanship, the suit says.

Weisburg claims in the lawsuit that she moved into the home on the assumption that the mistakes would be corrected.

"Specifically the drywall was uneven and wavy; the 30 windows that came with the house were only single-hung windows, when they were specifically to be double-hung; all of the drywall corners were cracked and there are now cracks over the headers," the suit says. "The bedroom contained no shower and when Ideal tried to install a shower, they broke that.

"There was a plethora of other defects in the housing."

According to the suit, Weisburg incurred damages of $50,000 because of the defendants' breach of merchantability, and another $50,000 because of a breach of warranty of fitness for particular purpose.

Therefore, Weisburg, through attorney Stephen P. Swisher, seeks $100,000 and other relief the court deems necessary.

The case has been assigned to Judge Irene Berger.

Kanawha Circuit Court case number 07-C-926