(Emphasis added; citation omitted.) Torre v. Derenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 305, 122 A.2d 25 (1956). "Liability for an injury due to defective premises does not depend on title, but on possession and control."
We have had occasion to employ the concept of "exclusive possession and control," contrary to the claim of the defendant, in discussing the landlord's liability to a tenant in connection with the use of demised premises, i.e., that part of the premises leased to and placed in the tenant's exclusive possession and control. Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25; Masterson v. Atherton, 149 Conn. 302, 306, 179 A.2d 592. The jury could have found on the evidence that the stairway was not part of the demised premises and that only the four-room apartment was within the exclusive possession and control of the tenant. Zorn v. Beal, 134 Conn. 697, 703, 60 A.2d 655.
The furnace, air ducts and cellar ceiling in question were therefore within the demised premises. Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25. The plaintiffs seem to assert the following defective conditions, although their claims on this vital point lacked clarity: (a) the failure to have fire stops; (b) the absence, or improper design, of an inner liner in the furnace; (c) the inadequacy of the heating capacity of the furnace; (d) the furnace's improper type of return air system; (e) the lack of insulation on the furnace bonnet and air ducts and on the beams and woodwork near the top of the furnace and the air ducts; and (f) cracks in the furnace and in the inner liner (if there was any), claimed to have resulted from the negligence of a person who repaired the furnace in 1957 at the behest of the defendant.
In such a circumstance, the applicable rule of law is that in the absence of some agreement to the contrary, the sidewalk and curb were, as a matter of law, included in Toys' leasehold and were under the lessee's control. Lewis v. Kasimer, 153 Conn. 13, 17, 211 A.2d 837 (1965); Bentley v. Dynarski, 150 Conn. 147, 151, 186 A.2d 791 (1962); Torre v. Derenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25 (1956); Martel v. Malone, supra, 138 Conn. 389-390. Section 6.02 of the lease provides:
We have said that "[i]t has long been the settled rule in this State that evidence of subsequent repairs is inadmissible to prove negligence or an admission of negligence at the time of the accident." Carrington v. Bobb, 121 Conn. 258, 262, 184 A. 591 (1936); see Rokus v. Bridgeport, supra, 65. This court, however, has admitted evidence of subsequent remedial measures if offered for other purposes such as: (1) to establish the defendant's control of the premises where a defect was located; Wright v. Coe Anderson, Inc., 156 Conn. 145, 155, 239 A.2d 493 (1968); Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 307, 122 A.2d 25 (1956); Shegda v. Hartford-Connecticut Trust Co., 131 Conn. 186, 188, 38 A.2d 668 (1944); (2) to show feasibility of repair in product liability cases; Sanderson v. Steve Snyder Enterprises, Inc., supra; and (3) to show the general area or scene of the injury. Rokus v. Bridgeport, supra; Blanchard v. Bridgeport, supra. The rule of exclusion is "based on narrow public policy grounds, not on an evidentiary infirmity."
So far as the evidence discloses, the steps in question were used only as a means of access to or egress from the rear of the single-family house which the plaintiff rented from the defendant. Under these circumstances, in the absence of some agreement to the contrary, the steps, as an integral part of the premises, were, as a matter of law, included in the plaintiff's leasehold and were under the lessee's control, and the lessor was under no duty to repair them. Bentley v. Dynarski, 150 Conn. 147, 150, 186 A.2d 791; Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25; Martel v. Malone, 138 Conn. 385, 389, 85 A.2d 246; Central Coat, Apron Linen Service, Inc. v. Indemnity Ins. Co., 136 Conn. 234, 237, 70 A.2d 126. The appendices to the briefs contain no evidence of any express agreement that the defendant was to retain control of the rear steps, while leasing the entire remainder of the house to the plaintiff.
Ordinarily, a tenant takes the premises as he finds them. He bears the risk of any defective conditions which are within the demised area under his exclusive possession and control. Masterson v. Atherton, 149 Conn. 302, 306, 179 A.2d 592; Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25. This rule, however, does not apply to defects which are the result of faulty design or disrepair and which existed at the beginning of the tenancy, were not discoverable by the tenant on reasonable inspection, and were known, either actually or constructively, to the landlord. Masterson v. Atherton, supra, 307.
Ordinarily, under an oral lease of a tenement in a building housing more than one family, the lessor neither impliedly warrants that the demised premises are in a reasonably safe condition nor impliedly undertakes to keep in reasonable repair the portion of the premises leased to and placed in the exclusive possession and control of the lessee. Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 306, 122 A.2d 25; Masterson v. Atherton, 149 Conn. 302, 306, 179 A.2d 592. In the absence of an express or implied agreement to the contrary, the lessee of a tenement such as the one involved in this case acquires an exclusive occupancy and control of the tenement and, as incidental thereto, the parts of the structure which form an integral part of the tenement.
All parties agree that on the evidence she was a social guest and consequently her status was that of a licensee. Laube v. Stevenson, 137 Conn. 469, 473, 78 A.2d 693; Lubenow v. Cook, 137 Conn. 611, 613, 79 A.2d 826; Torre v. DeRenzo, 143 Conn. 302, 308, 122 A.2d 25; Hennessey v. Hennessey, 145 Conn. 211, 213, 140 A.2d 473. The duty of one in the position of the defendant Bertha, the appellant, to a licensee like the decedent was recently restated in Hennessey v. Hennessey, supra. It need not be repeated except to note that it is limited to the exercise of reasonable care (a) to refrain from actively subjecting the licensee to danger and (b) under certain circumstances to warn the licensee of certain types of dangerous conditions on the premises. The present complaint contained no allegation even suggestive of a violation of either duty. Once the status of the decedent as a social guest was established, recovery was impossible under the allegations of the complaint.
In the first count, the plaintiff charged in substance that the defendants were negligent in that they had constructed and maintained, or knowingly had permitted to be constructed and maintained, a wire rope barrier along a common passageway on the housing authority premises, a barrier which the defendants knew or should have known was dangerous to the plaintiff and other tenants, and that it caused the plaintiff's fall. It is, of course, the duty of a landlord to use reasonable care to keep in a reasonably safe condition the parts of the premises over which he reserves control. Torre v. DeRenzo, 143, Conn. 302, 305, 122 A.2d 25; Tenney v. Pleasant Realty Corporation, 136 Conn. 325, 329, 70 A.2d 138. The burden was on the plaintiff to prove a breach of this duty by the defendants in order to establish a basis for her recovery. The ultimate test of the duty is to be found in the reasonable foreseeability of harm resulting from a failure to exercise reasonable care to keep the premises reasonably safe. Hassett v. Palmer, 126 Conn. 468, 473, 12 A.2d 646; Botticelli v. Winters, 125 Conn. 537, 542, 7 A.2d 443. This does not mean foreseeability of any harm whatsoever or foreseeability that the particular injury which resulted would occur.