All Black sues over leaky home

Former first-five claims he wasn’t told house he bought from associates leaked – and he’s spent $250,000 fixing it. Steve Kilgallon reports.

Retired All Black Ian Dunn still drinks in the same pub as his former friends, real estate agents Ian Fairley, Keith ‘‘Chuck’’ Norris and Gary ‘‘Banza’i’ Boucher. But now they sit at opposite ends of the bar.

Dunn is suing Boucher and Tait Realty, the company the trio worked for, claiming they knowingly sold him a leaky home that so far has cost him $260,000 in repairs and another $40,000 in legal bills.

Dunn, who won three test caps in 1983, admits not doing much research when he bought Boucher’s own house eight years ago because he knew the men well. He co-owned race horses with Tait boss Fairley, and drank with them all at the pub he part owned, the Jovial Judge – which was two doors away from the Team Tait offices in Walton St, central

Whanga¯ rei.

Boucher, a real estate agent of eight years whose promotional material says that ‘‘as a result of his honesty and integrity has been very successful’’ had also sold Dunn his previous house.

Dunn got a knockdown deal: Boucher had tried to sell the house himself for $600,000 two years earlier. When he had no luck, he enlisted Norris as his agent, who sold it to Dunn for just $420,000 in late 2011.

The Dunns moved into the house in Fairview Dr, marketed as a ‘very desirable residence… a warm family home’ offering ‘peace, privacy and panache’, in February 2012. Just a week later, Dunn says it began to leak.

He claims that while Norris suggested he claim on insurance, Fairley told him ‘‘we won’t walk away from this’’ and they agreed a four-way split of the $8400 repair bill between Dunn, Boucher, Fairley and the Tait company. Fairley denies making that comment to Dunn.

But later, the kitchen ceiling began to bow, then sprung a major leak. The builder who came to investigate, says Dunn, thought his house was worth only the value of the land it sat on.

Until then, he says, he had no idea he’d bought a leaky home. He claims Norris dissuaded him from having a LIM report and told him the house was sound, bar a couple of leaks after storms which had been repaired. Norris strenuously denies this.

Dunn says he ‘‘bit the bullet’’ and had most of the house re-clad in 2016, for more than $250,000. He claims tradies who worked on it said they knew the house had been repeatedly repaired for weathertightness issues.

He has a report from building consultant Phillip Crow, who found extensive evidence of leaking, and a statement from his builder Jonathan Youngs, who had a team of six working for six months on the repairs. Youngs thought ‘‘it was readily apparent… the house had been leaking for a number of years’’, and believed he had no alternative but a complete reclad: he estimated 20 per cent of the framing and 85 per cent of the cladding was rotten.

Dunn has since discovered three sets of potential purchasers had withdrawn after getting unfavourable builder’s reports.

Not until discovery for the court case did he also learn of an inspection report from the Whanga¯ rei District Council, commissioned by Boucher, which said the house could have weathertightness issues.

The Field Advice Notice from August 2011 says Boucher had implied the house might be leaky, and the official, Kevin Richards, pointed out weathertightness and cladding issues. It also revealed a cladding expert had recently viewed the property on behalf of a potential purchaser and told them not to buy. Boucher was advised to get a registered building surveyor’s report (he did not, but he did conduct recommended repairs to the deck and had a Thermal Imaging report suggesting leaks were contained to one small part of the house).

Dunn’s claim to the

Whanga¯ rei High Court is that the defendants knew, or should have known the property was ‘‘subject to hidden or underlying weathertightness defects’’ and was a ‘‘significant potential risk’’.

Dunn is now suing Boucher and Tait Realty and is awaiting a high court hearing later this year.

His statement of claim asks for $300,000 to cover repairs (the garage has yet to be re-clad), his legal fees, estimated at $60,000, and $50,000 for stress and inconvenience.

The first defendant is Tait Realty; the second is Boucher, his wife Judith and daughter Judith Smart, as trustees of their family trust, which owned the house.

Dunn says he would be happy to accept less than the full price of repairs because he accepts the work has increased the value of his home, which now has a CV of $710,000, and he and his wife Yvonne are happy to stay there.

Dunn’s lawyer, Michael Black QC, has won court rulings forcing Boucher to give more extensive responses to questions, called interrogatories, about what happened with the house. There will be another court hearing later this month about Boucher’s replies.

Dunn is likely to call Boucher’s estranged son-in-law, Vince Dempster, to give evidence about the condition of the house when Boucher was living there.

The court refused an application from Tait Realty’s lawyer, Jeremy Browne, to

‘I’ve got no f ...... money. I’m on the bones of my arse at 72 years of age.’ GARY BOUCHER

sleep at night. I am getting too old for this’’.

Later, he calls back to say Norris and Fairley are angry with him for talking to Sunday News.

Fairley said: ‘‘It’s before the courts. I’m not commenting.’’ Norris, who has retired from real estate, said Dunn’s claim he told Dunn not to bother with a LIM and that the house wasn’t leaky was ‘‘nonsense’’. ‘‘There had been two leaks I told him about that were not disputed,’’ he says. After that, he consults his solicitor and decides not to comment further. Both will be called as defence witnesses at trial.

Because Boucher has no money, Dunn knows he needs a judgment against Tait to recoup any of his lost money. Tait has denied Dunn’s claim and the real estate firm’s defence will include the arguments that Dunn’s own negligence contributed to his losses and that aspects of the claim are time barred.

Dunn says not many know about the dispute – but those involved are prominent figures in Whanga¯ rei. Fairley bought the Tait business from its owner, the late Bob Tait (father of Olympian Blyth Tait) in 2006; Norris is team liaison for the Northern Knights provincial cricket team.

Dunn, meanwhile, owned the Judge pub with well-known excops Gavin Benney and Ross Kneebone before selling up his shareholding in 2016. He was Wayne Smith’s deputy at firstfive for the All Blacks, playing 13 times, including three tests; he also played for New Zealand Maori, New Zealand Colts and for a decade for Northland (then called North Auckland). His brother Eddie was also an All Black.

Boucher reckons he was never friends with Dunn, saying: ‘‘I just knew him, he wasn’t a mate of mine… just a joker I knew about.’’

Either way, they all still seem to patronise the same pub, less than 20 paces away from the Tait office. So while the men are no longer on speaking terms, they still occasionally see each other there. Dunn sees no reason to stop going. ‘‘I don’t mind. I’ve got nothing to hide …. it’s a little bit awkward.’’