Rocket Mortgage, LLC, fka Quicken Loans Inc., et al. v. Phillip Alig, et al.

The plaintiff class here was awarded nearly $10 million in statutory damages without establishing that any unnamed class member was injured. The class members claimed that the defendants committed a procedural error in how they ordered home appraisals. The Fourth Circuit acknowledged that the record was “devoid of evidence” that the supposed error actually affected any of the unnamed class members or the accuracy of their appraisals. By a divided vote, the panel nevertheless affirmed the class certification and the class-wide statutory-damages award, because the class members all faced the same risk of harm: the appraisers had been “exposed” to the supposed procedural error, and the class members paid for the appraisals, even though the court “cannot evaluate whether” any harm ever materialized. The questions presented are as follows:

1. Whether basing Article III standing to seek damages on a mere risk of harm, without evidence that the harm ever materialized, is inconsistent with this Court’s holding just a few months later in TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez.

2. Whether purchasing a product or service automatically creates a “financial injury” cognizable under Article III, even if the product or service provided precisely the benefit the consumer bargained for.

3. Whether a class can be certified (or remain certified) when many class members suffered no Article III injury.