Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has signed into law a bill that will provide some financial relief to victims of crumbling concrete foundations and help to prevent the problem in the future.
The bill requires properties to be reassessed for property tax purposes at the owner’s request as long as the property owner submits a copy of a written evaluation, prepared by a professional engineer, indicating the foundation contains defective concrete.
The new assessment will be valid for five years or until the foundation is fixed.
Homeowners who repair their foundations must notify their town’s assessor within 30 days, at which time the property will be revalued.
The bill also requires a property owner to provide his local building official with documentation showing the name of the concrete supplier and installer for structures built on or after Oct. 1.
To encourage more homeowners with properties that have crumbling concrete to file a formal complaint with the Department of Consumer Protection, the legislation also provides seven years of confidentiality for those who file.
“We know this is an urgent issue for homeowners in eastern Connecticut,” Consumer Protection Commissioner Jonathan Harris said. “Now more records will be kept about foundations that are poured, homeowners’ privacy will be better protected, and homeowners with deteriorating foundations may even get some property tax relief.”
However, homeowners and local officials, including Willington First Selectwoman Christina Mailhos, have questioned the potential impact to municipalities of decreasing property values, which will raise tax rates.
She has said that 37 percent of the single-family homes in her town were built in the timeframe that has been identified as when the faulty concrete foundations would have been poured.
Mailhos said that if half of those homeowners were to take advantage of the reassessment option, it could leave a $1.5 million hole in the town’s $15 million budget.
To date, there have been 223 formal complaints about crumbling foundations from residents in 19 towns, DCP spokeswoman Lora Rae Anderson said.
“We know there are a lot more houses out there … that haven’t come forward,” Harris said on Wednesday at a meeting on the subject in South Windsor.
However, he noted that while those who have filed with the DCP are now exempt from freedom-of-information requests, “There are other ways of finding out what’s going on — driving around a neighborhood could be one.”
Harris continued to urge property owners to file with the DCP to assist with a more thorough investigation, which is expected to be completed this fall.
While the bill attempts to provide relief to those suffering with decimated property values and estimates in excess of $250,000 to replace a foundation, it does nothing for potential homebuyers.
“The obligation to disclose any known damage to a home being sold remains with the property owner selling the home,” Anderson said.
While those who have filed a complaint with the state are protected for seven years, the protection “does not relieve them of their responsibility to inform a prospective home buyer of a crumbling foundation,” Anderson said.
The Senate unanimously approved the legislation last month, and the House approved it in April on a 139-4 vote.
The only area lawmaker to not vote on the bill was Rep. Kelly J.S. Luxenberg, D-Manchester.
Although Luxenberg was among the 20 co-sponsors of the original bill and testified in support of the legislation in early March, she later learned that her home’s foundation is failing and recused herself from the vote.
As the issue continues to affect residents throughout northeastern and central Connecticut, some now fear the potential impact of banks calling mortgages of homes that have plummeted in value.
South Windsor Mayor Thomas Delnicki said Wednesday that if banks were to call mortgages it would “literally have a catastrophic effect on the economy of the state of Connecticut.”
