WATER DAMAGE, ALLEGED TO HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY HURRICANE SANDY, WAS DEMONSTRATED TO HAVE RESULTED FROM WEAR AND TEAR AND WAS THEREFORE SUBJECT TO THE POLICY EXCLUSION (THIRD DEPT).

The Third Department determined the insurer’s motion for summary judgment in this property damage case was properly granted. Plaintiff alleged  water damage to its hotel was caused by Hurricane Sandy. There was an exclusion in the policy for “wear and tear.” The insurer’s expert presented evidence that the water damage was due, inter alia, to improper flashing and the absence of proper caulking around the windows:

The dictionary definition of “wear and tear” is “the loss, injury, or stress to which something is subjected by or in the course of use” … . Nothing in the policy language suggests that an average insured would expect the phrase to have another meaning or that the language is subject to any other reasonable interpretation.

As for the application of the exclusion in this case, defendant supported its summary judgment motion with the affidavit and report of an engineer with experience in “structural investigation[s] and failure determinations” who inspected the property several weeks after the hurricane. His examination of the hotel’s exterior walls revealed “improper flashing detail” consisting of failed caulk that had originally been installed to seal the areas where each room’s exterior walls and windows met the hotel’s concrete floors and surrounding masonry walls. According to the engineer, the caulk had separated from these surfaces as a result of age and lack of maintenance, creating spaces through which water could migrate into the walls. The engineer observed significant deterioration in the walls’ internal framing, as well as other indications that water had been seeping into the walls for a long time; in a follow-up inspection several years later, he also found evidence that water continued to enter the walls after the hurricane as a result of the failed caulk, causing new damage to surfaces that had been repaired after the storm. Superhost Hotels Inc. v Selective Ins. Co. of Am., 2018 NY Slip Op 02519, Third Dept 4-12-18

INSURANCE LAW (WATER DAMAGE, ALLEGED TO HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY HURRICANE SANDY, WAS DEMONSTRATED TO HAVE RESULTED FROM WEAR AND TEAR AND WAS THEREFORE SUBJECT TO THE POLICY EXCLUSION (THIRD DEPT))/WEAR AND TEAR (INSURANCE LAW, WATER DAMAGE, ALLEGED TO HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY HURRICANE SANDY, WAS DEMONSTRATED TO HAVE RESULTED FROM WEAR AND TEAR AND WAS THEREFORE SUBJECT TO THE POLICY EXCLUSION (THIRD DEPT))/WATER DAMAGE (INSURANCE LAW, WEAR AND TEAR, WATER DAMAGE, ALLEGED TO HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY HURRICANE SANDY, WAS DEMONSTRATED TO HAVE RESULTED FROM WEAR AND TEAR AND WAS THEREFORE SUBJECT TO THE POLICY EXCLUSION (THIRD DEPT))/EXCLUSIONS (INSURANCE LAW, WEAR AND TEAR, WATER DAMAGE, ALLEGED TO HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY HURRICANE SANDY, WAS DEMONSTRATED TO HAVE RESULTED FROM WEAR AND TEAR AND WAS THEREFORE SUBJECT TO THE POLICY EXCLUSION (THIRD DEPT))