Right to claim a lien

[HDRchampion]

We have a small backyard, so instead of mowing the back, decided to just cement it. We hired the same guy who put up our deck a few years ago as we were pretty happy with the work he did & was cheap. This time around though, i just receive a letter from a concrete company saying that if they dont get paid for their work, they can put a lien claim to my property.

So if the sub contractor doesn't pay the cement company, i will end up having to pay twice pretty much or i get lien on my property. This is such a dumb law & can allow crooked contractors an easy way to bail on a final project.

I know this was a formality letter but scared the shit out of me. This was a total wakeup call and have never heard of this before. I know there are some homeowners here in this forum, have any of you had a bad contractor?

 

[FilthyRear]

I've never heard of anything like that before. Is that really a state law?

 

[BanishingFlatsAC]

Yep. The concrete guy is putting a lean on your house because your shady contractor never paid him. This is why you never pay a contractor till you have paid invoices from the subs.

If you have an invoice from the contractor that has the concrete listed on it and is marked paid, you should be able to provide that in court and the sub will have to go after your contractor.

 

[sparksterz]

So if you go out and pay a contractor and the people who the contractor hires to do the work don't get paid, then they go after you?! Wow, that's horseshit. Shouldn't that be small claims between the contractor and the sub contractor at that point?

 

[BanishingFlatsAC]

So if you go out and pay a contractor and the people who the contractor hires to do the work don't get paid, then they go after you?! Wow, that's horseshit. Shouldn't that be small claims between the contractor and the sub contractor at that point?

Sub probably already tried to go after the contractor. Most of these cheap, fly by night, guys disappear after a good paying job and have a ton of litigation against them already, which forces the sub to go after the home owner. You gotta look at it from the subs point of view. He hasn't been paid for a few years.

 

[sparksterz]

Sub probably already tried to go after the contractor. Most of these cheap, fly by night, guys disappear after a good paying job and have a ton of litigation against them already, which forces the sub to go after the home owner. You gotta look at it from the subs point of view. He hasn't been paid for a few years.

I mean I get it, but if I buy a product from a company and they sell it to me I don't care if the company that sold me the product owes some other company money. That's what bankruptcy and lawyers are for. I wouldn't then go and find customers they sold the materials to and try to claim that's mine.

Ultimately I guess I'm not too surprised as I'm used to being continually disappointed in this country's legal system, but it shouldn't be "home owner beware" it should be "get fucked contractor". Hopefully this won't be too hard to hand wave away.

 

[HDRchampion]

Still it doesn't seem right to go after someone who isn't the cause of the problem. It should be between the contractor & subcontractor or subcontractor & their subcontractor.

Say homeowner pays the contractor but doesn't pay his subcontractor i get foot the bill...
Say homeowner pays the contractor & pays his subcontractor but that subcontractor doesn't pay for the cement people, i get foot the bill.

So the homeowner who already paid in full would also have to payout to whoever didn't get paid, then that homeowner has to go to small claims court to get money back from the asshole who decided to blow their money on hookers & blow...That's time & money, not to mention what happens if that contractor has no money to sue?

This is a dumb law...It would be like me not paying my contractor but in turn he would put a lien on my employer because i chose not to pay...Imagine if you go to dinner & you pay your meal in full, but the waiter & cook didn't get paid, so i would have to pay for there services again. derp derp derp

 

[mr_b]

This method of payment doesn't work in other facets of our economy. I don't see how it would apply here. The sub contractor purchased cement from the supplier. The supplier never got paid. How would the supplier ever be able to prove that the cement they have been unpaid for is sitting in your backyard, unless there is a bill of sale showing delivery to your address. I suppose state laws are different.

 

[Fuzzytaco]

Still it doesn't seem right to go after someone who isn't the cause of the problem. It should be between the contractor & subcontractor or subcontractor & their subcontractor.

Say homeowner pays the contractor but doesn't pay his subcontractor i get foot the bill...
Say homeowner pays the contractor & pays his subcontractor but that subcontractor doesn't pay for the cement people, i get foot the bill.

So the homeowner who already paid in full would also have to payout to whoever didn't get paid, then that homeowner has to go to small claims court to get money back from the asshole who decided to blow their money on hookers & blow...That's time & money, not to mention what happens if that contractor has no money to sue?

This is a dumb law...It would be like me not paying my contractor but in turn he would put a lien on my employer because i chose not to pay...Imagine if you go to dinner & you pay your meal in full, but the waiter & cook didn't get paid, so i would have to pay for there services again. derp derp derp

If you never sell your house then you don't have to worry about the lien. Next time use a reputible contractor.

 

[HDRchampion]

If you never sell your house then you don't have to worry about the lien. Next time use a reputible contractor.

I used the same contractor 2 years ago who did my deck. The letter had a CC to someone else, im guessing was his subcontract. So either my contractor didn't pay that guy or the that guy chose to keep the money. Either way, im the one who has to deal with it pretty much. I never heard of this law & it really doesn't make sense if you apply this in the real world.

Just giving you guys a heads up if you planning to get any work done to your house.

 

[GohanX]

As the homeowner, you are ultimately the boss and responsible for people getting paid. That being said, I'd contact a local attorney and see what he says. This is one of those things where you really need to look at the paperwork to see who is responsible for what. What might have to happen is you pay the concrete guy and then you sue the original contractor to recoup.

On the other hand, he may have no real right to place a lien on your property and is just doing it as a scare tactic to get paid by someone.

 

[BanishingFlatsAC]

I used the same contractor 2 years ago who did my deck. The letter had a CC to someone else, im guessing was his subcontract. So either my contractor didn't pay that guy or the that guy chose to keep the money. Either way, im the one who has to deal with it pretty much. I never heard of this law & it really doesn't make sense if you apply this in the real world.

Just giving you guys a heads up if you planning to get any work done to your house.

My wife used to watch the Mike Holmes show where he would fix shitty construction. They would often highlight folks who would pay a contractor upfront for all the work and they would take off or guys who do shitty work and if you refused to pay, you'd get a lien out on your house. If you're not running a construction company, there is no reason for you to hire a GC. You should be your own GC and hire the subs yourself, that way you can check the guys out with the BBB or something like Home advisor. As Fuzzy stated, this is going to be on your house till you either sell it or pay it. I'd advise getting all of your invoices from the GC that you have on file and contacting a lawyer.

 

[Fuzzytaco]

There is no shortage of shady GCs out there, unfortunately. Fortunately however, a lot of them are not smart enough to incorporate, in which case you can go after their personal assets.

 

[BanishingFlatsAC]

There is no shortage of shady GCs out there, unfortunately. Fortunately however, a lot of them are not smart enough to incorporate, in which case you can go after their personal assets.

I'm assuming this is what happened to HDR's GC and the guy is probably tapped, which is why the sub is going after him. Home repair is so fucked up.

 

[ECZangief]

This is why I live in a trailer.