Facts
- The Eppersons ordered a new custom-built Liberty double-wide mobile home through a Liberty dealer, providing specific design changes and features.
- Liberty generated a production order that identified the Eppersons as the customers, and the order traveled with the home during manufacture.
- The Eppersons purchased the home for $25,982.50 using installment financing.
- After moving in, the home exhibited serious defects, including a dangerously faulty electrical system, structural buckling at the joint between sections, and persistent roof leaks.
- Liberty and the dealer attempted repairs over an extended period without curing the problems; Liberty ultimately indicated the home required complete rewiring.
- The Eppersons incurred added living expenses when they had to move into smaller temporary housing during repairs and experienced fear of fire and major disruption to family life.
- The additional expenses contributed to payment difficulties, and the finance company repossessed the home.
Issues
- Whether the evidence was sufficient for a jury to find Liberty liable for breach of express and implied warranties and related obligations under the Magnuson–Moss Warranty Act.
- Whether the jury’s award, including consequential damages and damages for mental anguish, was legally recoverable and supported by the evidence, or required JNOV, a new trial, or remittitur.
Decision
- The Supreme Court of Alabama affirmed the judgment for the Eppersons.
- The court held the evidence permitted findings that the home failed to conform to Liberty’s warranties and was not of merchantable quality.
- The court upheld the $194,174.70 verdict, including consequential losses and mental-anguish damages, and found no basis for JNOV, new trial, or remittitur.
Legal Principles
- A manufacturer that issues express and implied warranties for a custom-built dwelling may be held liable when pervasive defects render the product unsafe or unfit, even if a dealer handled retail sale or service efforts.
- Consequential damages are recoverable for losses reasonably foreseeable from breach of warranty, including costs and financial harm tied to extended repair failures.
- Under Alabama law, mental-anguish damages may be awarded for breach of contract or warranty involving a home or dwelling when emotional distress is a foreseeable result of the breach.
- JNOV is improper where material issues were supported by evidence on which reasonable jurors could differ; a jury verdict is entitled to strong deference, especially after denial of a motion for new trial.
- Appellate courts will not order remittitur absent a showing that the award resulted from passion, prejudice, or other improper motive.
Conclusion
The court left intact a substantial jury verdict against a mobile-home manufacturer, holding that evidence of severe defects and failed repairs supported findings of warranty breach and supported recovery of foreseeable economic losses and mental anguish arising from loss of safe, habitable housing.