I was at a golf course that had homes on the course and I had a ball go astray and hit a window VERY hard. I saw the window and it was one that would have cost a substantial amount to replace, but fortunately it wasn’t broken.
My question is:
Had the ball broken the window would I have been liable or the course?
Is protocol for people that live on a course to just blow it off as part of the expense of living on a golf course?
thanks,
hh
I think what happens to balls you hit are your responsibility. There was a story a while back about a guy who hit a ball into a bunker, unaware that there was someone in the bunker. It hit him in the head and he ended up with major brain damage and needing full-time care for the rest of his life. The first guy had to pay for all this, which put him in massive debt, effectively ruining both lives. I can’t find an article but hopefully someone else will.
It’s your expense. The house owner eats the expense only if you get away. I think it’s a nasty habit that developers need to stop, to include expensive houses up against greens. Their excuse is the obsene amounts of money, which can’t be passed up, and I would want the dough too. The thing is these people should have a contract that provides for the greens to pay for repairs when a ball breaks something. They don’t though so don’t break it or you bought it.
A friend of mine lives in a “mansion” on a golf course, and one thing the developer did was put a type of almost bullet-resistant glass on the side that faces the course. And it’s true he has never had a broken window.
Doesn’t stop, however, the golf balls from whanging the fuck out of their siding, expensive grill, lawn furniture, and other items, requiring touch-up paint and even replacement of side shingles once a year. In those cases the covenant with the course has specified that the person hitting the ball is responsible 100%, and that the homeowner is obliged to run out of their back yard, approach a bunch of drunk American sports-crazed males stinking of Bud Light and “Axe”, and try to get them to hand over their personal information so they can pay for the repairs. Oh yeah, that doesn’t work if you happen to be at work when it happens, which is the case most of the time.
Doesn’t bother him, however; his opinion is that people that choose to live on a golf course either accept it as par for the course (pun intended) or else they’re stupid for thinking that golf balls wouldn’t hit them.
My Dad built a house on property right next to a golf course. The windows facing the course are made of Lexan, probably the material you were looking for.
This is the General Questions Forum of the SDMB. Perhaps this level of bald-faced male-bashing might be better suited to the BBQ Pit? Just a thought, from one considerate Member to another. 
As for the OP, the difference between personal injury and material damage is gargantuan. Some of our esteemed attorney Dopers will no doubt be glad to expand upon that. I am guessing that the case law makes for interesting reads- are you surrendering your rights to compensation is personally injured just because you knowingly purchased a domicile adjacent to a golf course, or are you entitled to sit in the sun in your own back yard and believe that because you are in your yard, you should be safe and can pursue a golfer for compensation? Or, OTOH, do you actually surrender some personal rights when purchasing said land and house? If so, I cannot think of another housing arrangement that is found throughout the country where residents might well have to enter into such an agreement before being allowed to purchase a home.
Before this one gets out of hand—
Mod note:
Una. You DID go overboard.
Cartooniverse. Just report the post rather than try to correct a member in this forum. The back and forth hijack and slings and arrows just foul up the landscape.
We return you now to your program.
samclem GQ moderator
Since you admittedly “don’t do the Pit”, it’s a bit unreal that you recommend someone else do it.
However, I’ll agree with you that my comment was not really suitable for being in here as it reads. I did not intend it to be “male bashing”, I was actually thinking of it being more ribbing/teasing than anything else, since few would actually honestly consider golfing to be a sport of violent drunks wearing “Axe” (something marketed to teenagers); golf is something I generally picture sedate, non-violent retirees and middle-aged people doing. Thus it was actually meant to say that it probably isn’t a big deal to go out and approach people about damage, unless you’re not at home at the time, of course.
There’s a lot of questions, no answers, and not even an anecdote or IRL example. Was your real pupose in posting in this thread just to call attention to my gaff above? If so, fair enough, but you should either limit your scope in the future, or else click the “Report this Post to Moderator” function, as suggested by the Board rules. It certainly would have taken a lot less typing.
Sorry sam, your post got in while I was typing mine. Duly noted; I hope my poor attempt at humour in the first post is at least clearer, if still probably not acceptable nonetheless.
What makes the duffer so sure that the golf course preceded the homes? Surely sometimes the homes were there first, and the course developed later.
Either way, though, I would expect the golfer to voluntarily 'fess up, just as a driver should when responsible for damaging a parked car.
Ok, let’s dispel some mistaken statements here.
The course isn’t liable for errant shots. False. A course can be liable if it is demonstrably negligent in preventing a known hazard from the use of the course. That’s why a lot of courses in such situations have nets along the outer boundaries of their courses where in particular some errant ball might cause damage. This is especially true along streets, for reasons to be made clear below.
The homeowner won’t have to pay the cost of repairs. False. A homeowner who purchases a lot along a course can be held to have assumed the risk inherent in such ownership, because it is easily forseeable that balls will come crashing into your home in such cases. Most homeowners along courses pay substantially more for insurance precisely because they will be experiencing damages from which they have no recovery recourse. Often these days, those policies get VERY expensive unless special glass is put in the windows facing the course.
The golfer is liable for hitting another person, or property along the course. False. The golfer is only liable if he is negligent or reckless (or, of course, intentionally does something to harm someone/something). Thus, if a reasonable person in the golfer’s shoes would not have done what the golfer did, and the golfer does it anyway, and it proximately causes damage to another person or to a home, he can be found liable (or if he procedes with a reckless disregard of the probable consequences of his act). Otherwise, there is no strict liability on the part of the golfer.
So, how does this all play out?
Well, the homeowner along the course gets insurance for his house, just in case something major happens. If the golfer does something really stupid, and he is seen by the homeowner or someone else, perhaps the golfer ends up being sued in tort for the damages; more likely the homeowner tries to recover from the course. But unless the damage is something that the homeowner didn’t assume the risk of receiving, and the course knew or should have known that the damage was likely to occur, the course likely won’t be liable.
Oftentimes, as alluded to in a post above, to short-circuit multiple lawsuits over these issues, when a development goes in co-ordinated with a course, there is a covenant entered into by the lot owners not to sue the course for damage caused by errant balls, drunk golfers and their carts, etc.
Contrast, of course, the situation where a driver driving past the course gets hit by a ball, causing damage to his/her car (windshields primarily). In this case, it will often be difficult to assert the driver assumed the inherent risk of the activity of driving by a course, and the course may be liable if it could reasonably forsee the likelihood of such accidents happening. In such cases, you will often see nets go up.
As for the golfer liable for hitting someone on the course with a ball, that means that (assuming it didn’t get settled out of court) the jury determined that the golfer was negligent in attempting the shot, or was reckless in attempting the shot. This usually happens when you don’t take the proper precaution of waiting for other golfers to clear the area into which you are likely to hit a ball, or you see someone and don’t warn them of an incoming stray shot.
As with all tort law, this discussion is dependent upon the law of the state you are in; some states have laws specific to golf courses to protect one side or the other in such disputes, or have case law dealing with the issue.
Bobby Jones is a public course in the Buckhead area in Atlanta (he was also golf’s 1920’s version of Michael Jordan, which is why they named the course after him).
Anyway, a couple of holes on the course run directly next to busy Northside Drive. Multiple large (unmissable) signs on these holes state something like this:
“WARNING: According to Georgia law (Section 119.C, clause 8), golf course owners and\or operators cannot be held liable for any damages resulting from errant golf balls striking private property. Please golf with care in these areas.”
Of course, the verbiage is from my rusty memory and I completely made up the statute I referenced. But the signs DO reference an actual statute that exempts course owners from damages.
Maybe this is a state-by-state basis thing?
Au contraire.
WAG?
He who lives in a rock (stone) house shouldn’t throw glasses!
What they really need are zoning laws that require stronger windows near golf courses.
All store window glass will withstand being hit by a cinderblock, so the stuff is available.
This is not true. Can you be more specific?
Excellent summary! Also, various country clubs have various agreements between the developer, the course, the HOA, the playing public (or private members) and the homeowner that attempt to define the liabilities of each – and there’s probably a uniquely different agreement for each and every country club!
I would add only that unless one pays cash for a fairway home, he will in all likelihood be required to carry homeowner insurance by his lending institution. Most insurance companies will offer riders necessary to cover the damages typically sustained by homes on or near a golf course, and any lender aware of the home’s location would in most instances require such extended coverage.
I asked this same question, once, of a golfing buddy in Southern California. We were playing a new course that had been built inside of a residential area that sprawled in and out of several canyons in one of SoCal’s foothill communities, resulting in some very narrow fairways lined by some very expensive homes. Having an exceptionally wayward slice, I was concerned about what to do should I cause any damage. His response was that if the damage is visible, such as a broken window, glass table top, plant potters, that sort of thing, he always leaves his business card with a brief but sincere apology written on the back. He said he has never had a problem in his many years of doing this, and that the homeowner’s insurance companies undoubtedly cover the damage. As a matter of fact, he said this practice has actually brought his business several new accounts. He works, by the way, for an insurance company.
Fore! Is a Golfer Liable for His Lousy Shots? (reviewing New York law).
Found that in this Google Answer: Golf Course Liability
A very good summary, DS.
The very first time I played golf on a big course (with Par 4s and 5s), I was hacking away. I was hitting a bunch of grounders off the tee that went about 100-120 yards at a time. Around the seventh hole, I was about to tee off. The others in my group told me to go. I actually hit a decent shot, but it was a line drive, not a big booming shot.
There were a pair of big bushes in the middle of the fairway. As it turned out, there was a guy who was standing behind the bushes. And my shot, from about 220 yards away, nailed him in the groin.
He was very angry at me and even dropped his pants to show me where the ball hit him.
It would have been interesting to see how the police would have sorted it out since he was exposing himself in a public and there were women in my group.
But I had no idea that the man was standing where he was. And I didn’t expect anyone to be there nor that I could hit the ball that far. I was even worse the rest of the day as I was afraid of hitting anyone in about a 300 yard radius. (Yes, I’m so bad I was worried that I would hit the ball backward.)