70 N.C. App. 21 - Gaito v. Auman’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 3 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““[B]y virtue of superior knowledge, skill, and experience in the construction of houses, a builder-vendor is generally better positioned than the purchaser to know whether a house is suitable for habitation. He also is better positioned to evaluate and guard against the financial risk posed by a [latent defect], and to absorb and spread across the market of home purchasers the loss therefrom. In terms of risk distribution analysis, he is the preferred or ‘least cost’ risk bearer. Finally, he is in a superior position to develop or utilize technology to prevent such defects: and as one commentator has noted, ‘the major pockets of strict liability in the law’ derived from ‘cases where the potential victims ... are not in a good position to make adjustments that might in the long run reduce or eliminate the risk.’ R. Posner, Economic Analysis of Law 140-41 (2d ed. 1977).” Gaito v. Auman, 70 N.C.App. 21 , 318 S.E.2d 555, 559 (1984), aff'd, 313 N.C. 243 , 327 S.E.2d 870 (1985).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Tusch Enterprises v. Coffin