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REAL ESTATE Goodbye SPIS An Ontario Court of Appeal ruling essentially puts the nail in the coffin of residential real estate vendors' disclosure statements. BY KEVIN MARRON W hen Zoriana K r a w c hu k bought a house that had built on a peat bog, she had no idea of the repair costs that she would end up sinking into it. The Sudbury, Ont., home must have seemed like a great deal when she pur- chased it for $110,100 in 2004. In fact, she was keen enough to acquire the property that she offered $10,100 more been than the asking price. But it proved to be much less of a bargain when she subsequently discovered the founda- tion walls were subsiding and the City of Sudbury ordered her to correct the problem by having the house tempor- arily lifted off its foundations in order to excavate under it, then put in new fill, new footings, new foundations, and a concrete floor — all at a cost of $191,414.94, nearly twice the original purchase price. Since then, lawyers and courts have been deliberating over the question of what she should have known about the property before she bought it — what she should have been told, and what she ought to have found out for herself. And the Ontario Court of Appeal's recent answer to these questions could put property vendors and real estate agents on sticky legal ground. Like several other cases that have troubled residential real estate lawyers www.CANADIAN Lawyermag.com SEPTEMBER 2011 19 JuAN CARLOS SOLON