Claimants’ $22.5 million window: As many as 20,000 homes may qualify for settlement cash

By John Accola
Rocky Mountain News

With $22.5 million in settlement proceeds sitting in a Colorado bank, a statewide hunt is on for thousands of claimants.

The eligibility criteria: Must own a Colorado home with wood-framed windows built by Oldach Window Corp., a now-defunct Colorado Springs manufacturer.

After nearly six years of litigation, a Douglas County judge signed off last month on the last of four back-to-back settlements resolving product defect claims against Oldach and several of the firm’s vendors.

The total settlement package - $32.5 million before deducting 25 percent for plaintiff attorney fees and additional administrative costs- applies only to the manufacture, sale and installation of Oldach Tiltmaster 2000 and Casement 2010 windows in Colorado.

Oldach, founded in 1954, declared bankruptcy in 1999 just months after the Greenwood Village law firm Vanatta Sullan Sandgrund filed the complaint on behalf of a group of Douglas County homeowners.

“I called this case Mission Impossible,” lead counsel Scott Sullan said Wednesday.

“We were suing a company that was bankrupt, with no assets and an insurance policy that excluded window coverage. So we were very pleased to bring it around to this kind of settlement.”

The lawsuit alleged the wood-framed windows, installed throughout the Front Range in the 1990s, used a sealant and other materials that failed to hold up to Colorado’s extreme climate.

The complaint, later certified as a state class action for Colorado homeowners only, claimed the Oldach defendants were liable for damages, including replacement costs.

Sullan said the windows were used in more than 12,000 Colorado homes and possibly as many as 20,000.

“We don’t know the exact number of homes is the straight answer,” Sullan said. “But our best estimate is there were at least 12,100.”

In researching the case, Sullan said his legal team was hampered by missing invoices and a trail of documents that led researchers to a large cache of still-incomplete records in a factory attic in Nebraska.

“This was a monumental battle that went on for five years all over the country,” he said.

District Judge Paul King has appointed Colorado Management & Associates of Littleton to administer the claims process.

The earliest payout to eligible claimants isn’t expected until late this year, a company spokesman said.

To date, roughly 1,200 formal claims have been received with thousands more expected before a Dec. 20 deadline, said Bill Peterson, head of Colorado Management. Details are spelled out on the Web site www.coloradomanagement.com.

“It’s going great for the claimants,” Peterson said. “They are going to get some money back- to the tune of $22 million.”

Peterson said it’s conceivable that some homeowners will qualify for a maximum payout of $60,000 based partly on the number of Oldach windows claimed and their dimensions, as well as the total number of eligible claimants.

Legal notices of the settlement have been placed in Colorado newspapers, and “claims continue to be filed every day,” he said.

Furthermore, homeowners will be considered eligible for a claim based on the presence of Oldach windows in their homes and not necessarily their condition, Sullan said.

“What we’ve created is a pool of money, and all of it will be paid out,” he said.