Section 4

Citation: Section 4
Parent Document: Solomon v. Birger, 477 N.E.2d 137 (1985)
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts (state)
Effective Date: 1985-04-22
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2048661/solomon-v-birger/ ↗

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That language, of course, has a purpose. The real estate market is unorganized in the sense that it has a vast number of individual buyers and sellers, some of whom participate in the market once or twice in their lives and move elsewhere thereafter. It is a market in which amateurs are the preponderant *643players. See Capezzuto v. John Hancock Mut. Life Ins. Co., 394 Mass. 399, 404 (1985). Buyers can — and well advised ones do — arrange for title searches and home inspections. They may also ask specific questions about the condition of the property, which sellers are bound to answer honestly. Kannavos v. Annino, 356 Mass. at 48. Once the transaction is completed, the parties are well served by being allowed to go their separate ways. This does not mean that sellers have a license to lie and cheat. If there have been misrepresentations, there is an adequate remedy in tort, and to the extent that the misrepresentation has been fraudulently concealed, the time for action is extended by G. L. c. 260, § 12, as well as by those cases which deal with the inherently unknowable. See and" compare Graveline v. BayBank Valley Trust Co., ante 253 (1985). Beyond that remedy for misconduct, we do not think we should encourage persons to litigate about their leaking roofs, faltering furnaces, inadequate drainage, and cracking walls long after the fact.10

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