rox
Veteran Member
Paying the general contractor provides you no protection at all against a supplier or sub contractor filing a lien. Actually what you want to do s have the GC provide you with lien waivers. That big check you paid out upon delivery of the materials, you should have required a lien waiver form the material suppliers before you give any money. Actually what you do is have the GC run around and get you Lien Waivers, he come to you hat in hand wanting his check, which you gladly give him after he hands you the lien waivers. That is how the banks do construction lending, they only cut checks for progress payments when they have lien waivers.
Several times i had issues with General Contracts not paying me, the materials supplier, and coming to me and wanting a Lien Waiver so he could take it to the bank and get a draw. What i would do (and always I did this in a very courteous and professional manner) is tell the GC to tell the bank to cut us a check and I would take my lien waiver personally to the banker. I would give him my lien Waiver and he would give me my check.
So basically what I am saying is that you are better off not paying people until you get a lien waiver. They provie you a lien waiver, you write a check.
Most subs never file an Intent to File a Lien agaist the job/real estate becasue they want to keep getting work out of the General Contractor. So the two of them will fight it out and you won't even know it, and the subs and suppliers don't file a Notice of Intent. However in this case, the sub has figured ut that he is never going to get any future work out of this GS so he has nothing to loose and everything to gain by Filing the Intent to File a Lien. Plus if I remember right there were different time limits depending on if the construction job was a consumer or a commercial job. If I'm not mistaken I think that for a homeowner/consumer job the window was only 30 Days to file and Intent to File a Lien. For commercial projects I think it was 90 or 120 Days, form the last time you performed any work or provided materials to the job.
you should probably find out what the cut off dates are for your state. In other words 30 days after the job is finished nobody can file a lien against your property. If they are un happy they need to let a homeowner know right away, within that cut of period. Best bet is to exchange your check for Lien Waivers and also don't let anybody on your property to do any work at all after you ahve paid the GC in full, UNTIL that grace period is up, then let them on the property to do any corrections. See every time they step onto your property that extends their grace Period of sending a Notice of Intent To File a Lien. Which is exactly what we did in my example above. The grace peroid ran out, i didn't ahve the money in hand so we did some "make work" which re-opened up or grace period again, and in fact I did File the Intent to File a Lien. so fins out what these time limits are in yoru area and take the appropriate action. Since you ahve been hit already with one intent to File lien I would ask him right now for a Lien Waiver from the major materials suppliers. If he is the materials Supplier then he should give you a Lien Release. If he gripes at that there is a Partial lien relese that can be done also. He should have no problems giving you a Partial Lien Waiver. They are simple forms not at all long or complicated. At least in Wisconsin.
I do hope your GC is as good as you think he is.
Several times i had issues with General Contracts not paying me, the materials supplier, and coming to me and wanting a Lien Waiver so he could take it to the bank and get a draw. What i would do (and always I did this in a very courteous and professional manner) is tell the GC to tell the bank to cut us a check and I would take my lien waiver personally to the banker. I would give him my lien Waiver and he would give me my check.
So basically what I am saying is that you are better off not paying people until you get a lien waiver. They provie you a lien waiver, you write a check.
Most subs never file an Intent to File a Lien agaist the job/real estate becasue they want to keep getting work out of the General Contractor. So the two of them will fight it out and you won't even know it, and the subs and suppliers don't file a Notice of Intent. However in this case, the sub has figured ut that he is never going to get any future work out of this GS so he has nothing to loose and everything to gain by Filing the Intent to File a Lien. Plus if I remember right there were different time limits depending on if the construction job was a consumer or a commercial job. If I'm not mistaken I think that for a homeowner/consumer job the window was only 30 Days to file and Intent to File a Lien. For commercial projects I think it was 90 or 120 Days, form the last time you performed any work or provided materials to the job.
you should probably find out what the cut off dates are for your state. In other words 30 days after the job is finished nobody can file a lien against your property. If they are un happy they need to let a homeowner know right away, within that cut of period. Best bet is to exchange your check for Lien Waivers and also don't let anybody on your property to do any work at all after you ahve paid the GC in full, UNTIL that grace period is up, then let them on the property to do any corrections. See every time they step onto your property that extends their grace Period of sending a Notice of Intent To File a Lien. Which is exactly what we did in my example above. The grace peroid ran out, i didn't ahve the money in hand so we did some "make work" which re-opened up or grace period again, and in fact I did File the Intent to File a Lien. so fins out what these time limits are in yoru area and take the appropriate action. Since you ahve been hit already with one intent to File lien I would ask him right now for a Lien Waiver from the major materials suppliers. If he is the materials Supplier then he should give you a Lien Release. If he gripes at that there is a Partial lien relese that can be done also. He should have no problems giving you a Partial Lien Waiver. They are simple forms not at all long or complicated. At least in Wisconsin.
I do hope your GC is as good as you think he is.
