[WSBARP] Suicide disclosure

[Carmen Rowe]

I'm with Annie - *however, *reading a case on this topic from PA (see
below), I think the court raised good points that offset what I thought a
logical approach to "well sure it might matter/be a material issue to
disclose".

One thought in all this: I do think you face a significant risk, especially
if a violent death, of serious harm by way of the risk of litigation. The
question is not always about whether you're legally in the right. No one
wants to have to be the one to go through the hell of litigation & cost &
risk to forge new law on a novel issue. As I tell my clients, an
"interesting question" is not a good thing for them. I think that heavily
weighs in favor of disclosure.

Remembering, too, that there is a trend to allowing "tort" damages in WA's
classically buyer-friendly law, which in a situation like this might well
blow out damages to emotional distress etc. - an ugly situation to find
yourself in when you could have simply disclosed and avoided the whole
mess.

So (1) you could very well be facing litigation if you don't, and (2)
either put out a ton of money to risk it all, or settle for some
potentially large amount of money, thus really lose either way even if you
are in the legal right. So in advising a client, my advice on what to do
isn't going to be driven so much by whether they'd win in court (which is a
huge if to begin with) as whether it's worth the risk.

Especially in this market - someone will want to buy it for full value &
won't care, why take the chance.

Legally - the PA case (
https://law.justia.com/cases/pennsylvania/supreme-court/2014/48-map-2013.html)
raised the good point that it would be a very difficult precedent as every
person defines "psychological stigma" differently. What if it wasn't a
murder, but a murderer lived there? a child abused? etc.

I think WA heavily favors buyers - but I think (1) the fact some states
require it but not all, with no legal cases anyone seems to have found
saying it should be disclosed, weighs in favor of most courts considering
it to fall in the legislative realm if they want to go beyond physical
defects and (2) the PA reasoning is persuasive, coupled with (3) the type
of technical analysis Eric offers. While Annie's analysis is excellent, I
do think the courts' emphasis is on physical defects. Look at the rejection
of disclosure of an annoying neighbor, "bad neighborhood", etc., which as I
recall most if not all here that voiced an opinion agreeing that these were
not subjects of disclosure.

But ... see above about risk, either way.

My curiosity peaked, I did a little looking on how people viewed this
topic.

This was an interesting source I had NO idea was out there (though not
surprised) - "You can also visit Diedinhouse.com
<https://www.diedinhouse.com/>, a site that searches through millions of
records to determine whether a death has occurred at the address you enter."



Carmen Rowe



Phone: (360) 669-3576 (direct cell)
Email:  Carmen at GryphonLawGroup.com

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