"Yes."
"How long does the maintenance history run?"
"About twenty-one years."
Susan looked toward the property manager. "And our claim on his machine came from an asset line with no physical identifier?"
Vanessa answered, "The association also owned a generator of the same manufacturer and comparable capacity."
"That part is correct," I said. I opened the next section. "The original developer service record identified DSB7384KC."
Howard read both numbers. "7419 is the Cole Ranch machine?"
"Yes."
"7384 is the developer machine?"
"That is what the archived records show."
The property manager turned her laptop around. "I found the old turnover schedule." On the screen was standby generator DSB7384KC.
Howard leaned forward. "So 7384 was transferred with the development?"
"It appears to have been."
Vanessa said turnover records from that period were incomplete.
The attorney replied before I could: "Incomplete records may explain missing fields. They do not make two serial numbers the same machine."
Silence.
Howard returned to the modern asset sheet. "Why did 7384 lose its serial number in later records?"
The property manager explained that several management companies had handled the association over the years. The modern register had eventually been reconstructed from accounting data. Descriptions survived; some source documents did not.
Howard asked for the migration history. She opened three files. The earliest spreadsheet called the unit Gen B reserve equipment. A later system gave it asset 04-117. A conversion worksheet listed the last known location as unknown. The newest system showed reserve field storage.
"Who changed 'unknown' to 'field storage'?" Howard asked.
"I haven't found the source," she said.
"Was there a physical inventory?"
"Not one I can document."
Howard wrote something in the margin of his packet. "So the record became more specific while the supporting information became less specific."
Nobody disagreed. The asset name remained; its physical identity faded.