The Homes, the Defects, and the Strategy That Failed

Carl and Sandra Van Tassel, along with dozens of their neighbors, had purchased new single-family homes from McMillin Albany LLC at various times after January 2003. The development was in Albany, in Kern County — modest new construction in California's Central Valley. By 2013, the homeowners had documented what they described as defects in nearly every major system of their homes: the foundations, plumbing, electrical, roofing, windows, floors, and chimneys.¹

Represented by experienced construction defect attorneys, the homeowners filed suit against McMillin. Their complaint included eight causes of action — negligence, strict product liability, breach of contract, breach of warranty, and a statutory claim for violation of California Civil Code Section 896, the construction standards codified in the Right to Repair Act.

Then the homeowners made a calculated move. They voluntarily dismissed their Section 896 statutory claim — the SB 800 claim — and proceeded only on the common law causes of action. The logic was straightforward: the Right to Repair Act requires a lengthy pre-litigation notice-and-repair process before a homeowner can file suit. By dropping the statutory claim and proceeding only on negligence and strict liability, the homeowners' attorneys argued the Act no longer applied. They could go straight to court.²

McMillin immediately moved to stay the litigation, arguing the homeowners were required to follow the Act's pre-litigation procedures regardless of how they characterized their claims. The trial court denied the motion. McMillin appealed.

The Appellate Split That Forced the Supreme Court's Hand

The homeowners' strategy was not invented from thin air. It was based on a real split in California appellate authority that had existed since 2013. In Liberty Mutual Insurance Co. v. Brookfield Crystal Cove LLC, the Fourth District Court of Appeal had held that where a construction defect causes actual property damage, homeowners retain their common law claims and are not required to go through the Act's pre-litigation process. Two years later, in Burch v. Superior Court, the same district reaffirmed that position.³

The Fifth District disagreed. In its 2015 decision in the same McMillin case, the Fifth District held that the Right to Repair Act was the exclusive remedy for all construction defect claims on new residential homes sold after 2003 — regardless of whether the defects caused property damage, and regardless of how the homeowner chose to plead the claims. Common law negligence and strict liability claims were displaced by the statute.³

California builders and developers had been living with this conflict for years. Depending on which appellate district governed a given property, the same set of construction defects could be subject to entirely different procedural requirements. The California Supreme Court granted review to resolve it once and for all.

What the Supreme Court Actually Decided

In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Goodwin Liu, the California Supreme Court affirmed the Fifth District and resolved the split decisively in favor of builders. The court held that the Right to Repair Act is the virtually exclusive remedy for construction defect claims arising from new residential homes sold after January 1, 2003 — whether those claims involve pure economic loss, property damage, or both.⁴

The court's reasoning rested on the legislative history and text of the Act. When the Legislature passed SB 800 in 2002, it did so comprehensively — establishing detailed construction standards, a mandatory pre-litigation process, a right to repair for builders, and specific remedies for homeowners. The Legislature explicitly exempted only personal injury claims from the Act's coverage. Everything else — economic loss, property damage, structural failure — was captured by the statute.⁴

The practical consequence was immediate: homeowners cannot plead their way around SB 800 by dropping the statutory claim and relying only on common law theories. If the claim arises from a construction defect in a new home sold after January 1, 2003, the Act applies. The pre-litigation process must be completed. And if a homeowner files suit before doing so, the builder is entitled to a stay pending compliance.

The SB 800 Pre-Litigation Process: What Homeowners Must Do Before Filing Suit

The Right to Repair Act was designed to give builders a structured opportunity to fix defects before the costs and disruptions of litigation begin. For homeowners, understanding and correctly executing the pre-litigation process is not optional — it is a prerequisite to filing a lawsuit, and failure to follow it can result in a court stay and significant delay.

The SB 800 Construction Standards — What Builders Are Held To

The Right to Repair Act does more than create a pre-litigation process. Civil Code Section 896 establishes specific construction standards — functional performance requirements that California builders must meet for new residential homes. These standards are the benchmarks against which defect claims are measured, and they carry their own statutes of limitations.

What Claims Remain Available Outside SB 800

The McMillin ruling did not eliminate all common law claims against builders. The California Supreme Court was explicit that the Act's exclusivity has limits. Claims for personal injury caused by construction defects remain governed by common law and are not channeled through SB 800. Claims for fraud and breach of contract also survive independently of the Act — meaning a builder who made affirmative misrepresentations about a home's quality, or who violated specific contractual promises beyond the statutory standards, may still face those claims outside the SB 800 framework.⁴

How DiJulio Law Group Handles Construction Defect Claims in Southern California

The McMillin Albany ruling did not make construction defect claims harder to win — it made the process for pursuing them mandatory. For homeowners, that means two things matter above all else: acting within the statute of limitations, and correctly initiating and documenting the SB 800 pre-litigation process before any lawsuit is filed.

DiJulio Law Group has represented property owners in construction law disputes throughout Glendale, Los Angeles, and Southern California for more than 35 years. We advise homeowners on whether their defect claims fall under SB 800's framework or outside it, help clients navigate the pre-litigation notice and inspection process, and pursue litigation when builders fail to meet their statutory obligations or when repairs prove inadequate.

If you have discovered defects in a new or recently constructed Southern California home — whether it is a single-family residence, condominium, or townhome — understanding the SB 800 framework is the first step. The deadlines are real, the process is mandatory, and the decisions made at the outset of a construction defect claim can determine whether a homeowner gets meaningful relief or runs out of time.