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The Colorado Supreme Court affirms Woodbridge II’s “Adverse Use” Distinction

By: Luke Mecklenburg Last year, I posted regarding the Colorado Court of Appeals’ decision in Woodbridge II, which concluded that the “adverse use” element for prescriptive easement claims only requires the claimant to “show a nonpermissive or otherwise unauthorized use of property that interfered with the owner’s property interests.” Viento Blanco, LLC, 2020 COA 34 […]

| 4 min read | Tagged: , ,
LM
Former Associate

Amada Family Limited Partnership v. Pomeroy: Colorado Court of Appeals expressly affirms the continuing viability of the common-law after-acquired title doctrine and expressly recognizes utility easements by necessity

On May 27, 2021, a division of the Colorado Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Amada Family Limited Partnership v. Pomeroy, 2021 COA 73.  In that case, the court decided two significant issues that apparently had never been expressly ruled on by a Colorado appellate court before: (1) that Colorado’s common-law after-acquired title doctrine […]

LM
Former Associate

Woodbridge II and the Nuanced Meaning of “Adverse Use” in Hostile Property Rights Cases in Colorado

Earlier this year, the Colorado Court of Appeals issued an opinion addressing at length “whether the requirement that the use be ‘adverse’ in the adverse possession context is coextensive with adverse use in the prescriptive easement context.”  See Woodbridge Condo. Ass’n, Inc. v. Lo Viento Blanco, LLC, 2020 COA 34 (Woodbridge II), ¶ 2, cert. […]

| 7 min read | Tagged: , , ,
LM
Former Associate

Colorado Governor Polis’s Executive Order D 2020 101: Keeping Up with Colorado’s Shifting Eviction Landscape during COVID-19

On March 5, 2020, Colorado Governor Polis issues executive order D 2020 012, which among other things imposed temporary limitations on evictions, foreclosures, and public utility disconnections. After being amended and extended three times (through April 30, 2020 via D 2020-0131, then for an additional 30 days via D 2020 051, and finally for an additional […]

| 2 min read | Tagged: , , ,
LM
Former Associate

Know your Obligations: Colorado’s Statutory Expansions of the Implied Warranty of Habitability Are Now in Effect

The Colorado legislature had a busy session this year.  Among the several significant bills it enacted, HB1170 strengthens tenant protections under the implied warranty of habitability.  It became effective on August 2, 2019, so landlords and tenants alike are now subject to its requirements. The bill makes numerous changes to Colorado’s implied warranty of habitability, […]

| 5 min read | Tagged: , , ,
LM
Former Associate

Colorado Court of Appeals clarifies that a finding of irreparable harm is not required to enter a permanent injunction to enforce an easement

On March 21, 2019, the Colorado Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Rinker v. Colina-Lee, holding for the first time that the “irreparable harm” element typically required to grant a permanent injunction is not needed for injunctions issued to enforce easements. 2019 COA 45. While the facts underlying the case are long and somewhat […]

LM
Former Associate

Ten Years After Colorado’s Adverse Possession Amendment: a brief look backwards and forwards

In response to national outrage over an infamous adverse possession case in Boulder, Colorado, in which a lawyer and a judge intentionally took their neighbors’ undeveloped land through adverse possession, the Colorado legislature amended the state’s adverse possession statute (C.R.S. § 38-41-101) to make the claim significantly harder to prove.  It did this because it […]

LM
Former Associate

Under Colorado House Bill 17-1279, HOA Boards Now Must Get Members’ Informed Consent Before Bringing A Construction Defect Action

By: Luke Mecklenburg Last year, I wrote a post calling attention to stalled efforts in the Colorado legislature to pass  meaningful construction defect reform.  Shortly thereafter, the legislature got it done in the form of House Bill 17-1279.  This bill creates an important pre-litigation notice-and-approval process whenever an HOA initiates a construction defect action in its […]

| 6 min read | Tagged: , , , ,
LM
Former Associate

Pacing in Construction Scheduling Disputes

On a high level, construction delay litigation involves sorting out the impacts to the critical project path and determining which party is responsible for those impacts. One of the more difficult elements of this process is determining whether a delay would have occurred regardless of one party’s critical path impact due to a separate, independent […]

| 4 min read
LM
Former Associate

Colorado House Bill 1279 stalls over 120-day unit owner election period

With the session more than halfway through, the Colorado Legislature’s 2017 attempts at meaningful construction defect reform may fail again.  This year, the Legislature did not attempt a single-bill construction defect overhaul like those that have failed over the last half-decade.  Rather, it has sought to enact reforms on a piecemeal basis, with several smaller […]

| 3 min read
LM
Former Associate

Sierra Pacific v. Bradbury goes unchallenged: Colorado’s six-year statute of repose begins when a subcontractor’s scope of work ends

It’s official: the October 20, 2016 deadline to petition for certiorari  to the Colorado Court of Appeals on its decision in Sierra Pacific Industries, Inc. v. Bradbury has passed, so it appears that decision will stand. In Sierra Pacific, the Court of Appeals held as a matter of first impression that the statute of repose […]

| 2 min read
LM
Former Associate