Michigan Court of Appeals; Docket No. 205260; Unpublished
Judges Neff, Kelly, and Hood; Unanimous; Per Curiam
Official Michigan Reporter Citation: Not Applicable; Link to Opinion 
STATUTORY INDEXING:
Property Owned by Named Insured [§3123(1)(b)]
General Rule of Priority [§3125]
TOPICAL INDEXING:
Legislative Purpose and Intent
CASE SUMMARY:
On remand from the Supreme Court, a unanimous panel, of the Court of Appeals again (See Item 2046) interpreted the parameters of the "household exclusion" set forth in the property protection benefit provisions of section 3123(l)(b). This section excludes from property protection benefits damage to "property owned by a per son named in a property protection insurance policy... if the person named... was the owner, registrant or operator of a vehicle involved in the motor vehicle accident out of which the property damage arose."
The court held that the phrase "a person named in a property protection insurance policy" refers to the property protection insurance policy of the vehicle or vehicles involved in the accident at issue, as opposed to any property protection policy.
In so holding, the court stated that:
"We find no contextual evidence in the no-fault act that the Legislature intended the household exclusion to broadly apply to a person named in any property protection insurance policy.... In §3123, the reference to 'a person named in a property protection insurance policy' is followed thereafter with: 'if the person named... was the owner, registrant, or operator of a vehicle involved in the motor vehicle accident out of which the property damage arose.' We do not find the use of the article 'a' in this instance to be of particular significant. The use of the word 'a' appears to be dictated by the grammatical construction of the sentence, and the fact that the matter at issue is 'the motor vehicle accident,' than the policy or the vehicle, both of which are preceded by the use of the indefinite article 'a.' Moreover, we recognize, as apparently did the Legislature, that an accident may involve more than one vehicle and more than one policy, thereby precluding the use of the definite article 'the' before those words. See MCL 500.3125; MSA 24.13125; see also, Turner, supra at 34-35, 44-45. Nor do we find any indication in case law that has addressed the household exclusion that would indicate that the Legislature intended a universal reference to any named insured in any policy. The clear presumption in the legal analyses is that the household exclusion was intended to exclude from automobile no-fault coverage, property damage covered by a homeowner's policy of the insured or a household member who is also the owner, registrant, or operator of the vehicle involved."
