## Facts

- The Gables on Tuckerman is a townhouse-style condominium in Montgomery County, Maryland, governed by recorded declaration, bylaws, and plats.
- The Council of Unit Owners maintained a master property insurance policy with a $10,000 per-occurrence deductible.
- Dianne Anderson separately insured her unit through Erie Insurance Exchange under a unit-owner policy.
- In July 2004, a water heater in Anderson’s unit leaked, causing water damage confined to her unit’s interior; no other units or structural areas were affected.
- Anderson sought repair or payment from the Council; the Council declined.
- After Anderson paid her own policy deductible, Erie paid $6,358.23 for repairs and, as subrogee, sued the Council to recover that amount.
- The condominium documents generally assigned the Council responsibility to insure/repair common elements while requiring unit owners to maintain, repair, and insure their own units, including water-leak damage.

## Issues

1. Whether Maryland Real Property § 11-114 requires a condominium council to repair or replace property located within an individual unit after a casualty loss.
2. Whether § 11-114 requires the council to treat the master policy deductible as a common expense in a way that obligates payment for unit-interior damage.
3. How § 11-114 interacts with statutory and contractual allocations of maintenance and repair responsibilities between councils and unit owners.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals of Maryland affirmed judgment for the Council.
- The court held that § 11-114 does not require a condominium council to repair or replace an owner’s property within an individual unit after a casualty loss of the type presented.
- The court rejected reading the statute’s insurance requirements and deductible provisions as creating a broad duty to remediate unit-interior damage.
- The court treated the condominium instruments’ allocation of responsibility to unit owners for unit interiors as consistent with the statutory scheme.

## Legal Principles

- Statutory requirements that a condominium council maintain property insurance under § 11-114 do not, without clear legislative direction, create an affirmative duty to repair or replace unit-interior property after casualty loss.
- Section 11-114 must be read with the Maryland Condominium Act as a whole, including provisions distinguishing council responsibilities for common elements from unit-owner responsibilities for unit interiors (including maintenance, repair, and replacement).
- Amendments referencing insurance coverage for “units” were not interpreted as imposing a general obligation on councils to restore all interior components of individual units, particularly where the loss is confined to one unit and the governing documents allocate interior risk to owners.
- Courts will not construe § 11-114 to override condominium bylaws’ allocation of repair and insurance responsibilities absent clear statutory language requiring that result.

## Conclusion

Maryland’s highest court held that a condominium council’s statutory duty to maintain property insurance under § 11-114 does not make the council responsible for repairing casualty damage confined to the interior of an individual unit where the condominium documents place unit-interior maintenance and repair obligations on the unit owner.


Anderson v. Council of Unit Owners of Gables on Tuckerman Condo., 404 Md. 560, 948 A.2d 11 (2008)