Category: Civil law / Compensation disputes / Housing law
Location: Almaty, Bostandyk District Court
Outcome: All claims against our client were dismissed.
The issue and background
Our client, the owner of apartment 20, faced a claim from the downstairs neighbour, the owner of apartment 17, seeking compensation of KZT 490,452, together with court fees and representation costs, a total of KZT 551,704). The claimant alleged that an incident in our client’s apartment caused flooding and relied on a report prepared by the Matay property owners’ cooperative.
The challenges
- The cooperative’s report: The report submitted by the claimant identified a broken coupling in the defendant’s apartment as the cause of the flooding and expressly recommended that the defendant settle the compensation issue.
- The cooperative’s position: The cooperative’s representatives argued in court that utility networks within the defendant’s apartment were not common property and that the owner alone was responsible for their condition.
Our legal strategy and work
Our lawyers prepared objections and closely examined the evidence submitted by the claimant and the cooperative:
- We challenged the admissibility and reliability of the flooding report:
- We established that the cooperative’s commission had prepared the report without visiting or inspecting either apartment.
- We identified serious procedural failures: the defendant had not been notified and the inspection took place without his participation.
- We found material inconsistencies: different versions of the report had been issued to the parties, with different descriptions of the cause of the flooding and the utility networks.
- We established the correct legal status of the utility networks:
- Relying on Kazakhstan’s Law on Housing Relations and Almaty’s utility network maintenance rules, we argued that the sewer riser and its components, including the cast-iron coupling, passed through several apartments and served more than one unit.
- We explained that the riser’s location inside the defendant’s apartment did not make it his personal property. Responsibility for its condition and maintenance therefore rested with the condominium management body, the cooperative.
- Collection and presentation of evidence:
- We requested testimony from the emergency plumber who attended the incident. He confirmed that a ruptured cast-iron coupling on the common sewer riser had caused the leak.
The court’s decision
Bostandyk District Court of Almaty accepted the defence arguments:
- The flooding report was found to be unreliable evidence.
- The court confirmed that the sewer riser formed part of the building’s common utility systems, for which the cooperative, rather than the apartment owner, was responsible.
- The claims against our client were dismissed in full.
The key lesson
Even an official cooperative report blaming an apartment owner can be challenged. It is important to check how documents were prepared and distinguish the owner’s personal property from common building utility networks.
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