I Didn’t File My Lien On Time…Now What?

Over the weekend, I answered a question over on Avvo.com about mechanic liens that gets asked very often, and I thought it was a good idea to share here.

The question is this:   What are my legal rights as a contractor if my lien is not filed on time?

The question was asked related to Washington law, but the answer is applicable around the nation.   Mechanic liens are an excellent remedy – and I highly recommend preserving and using these rights when needed.   However, they are not a contractor’s only remedy.

What other rights does a contractor have?  Take a look at my answer here:

Liens are a terrific remedy for contractors. If you’re unpaid and file your lien on time, you acquire security rights against the property itself and are legally able to file suit against parties who you did NOT contract with (i.e. the property owner, if you are a sub).

However, if you don’t file a lien, you still have plenty of legal rights to recover what is owed to you.

Your rights, however, are exclusively against the party who you contract with. You have an action against them for breach of contract. The period to bring this suit is quite a bit longer, between 3-6 years, depending on the type of contract.*

*This is the statute for Washington.  Remember that the statute of limitations will be different depending on your state.

It’s important to contact a great construction attorney to bring a breach of contract suit if you are unpaid, and are too late to proceed with lien rights.    Find a construction attorney in your area at Avvo.com.

Zlien Partners with Avvo to Bring A Robust Legal Center to the LienPilot3

We just posted about the LienPilot’s brand new look.    Well, including in the overhaul is the addition of a Legal Center.   Every project administered by the LienPilot gets its very own Legal Center, where lien law information applicable to your specific project is displayed.

To make the Legal Center even more productive, we’ve partnered with Avvo.com, the world’s largest legal directory, to provide content from construction law attorneys around your project.   Still can’t find what you’re looking for?   You can ask an attorney from Avvo.com for legal advice…for free!

Take a look:

Chart Specific To Your Project

Aren’t you sick of charts and mechanic lien law digests that show you all the information you could possibly want to know about liens….but nothing about your specific project?   The LienPilot’s legal center solves this problem.  It learns about your project, and displays only the relevant info.   Starting with this chart.

The chart displays the Mechanic Lien Law and Preliminary Notice Requirements relevant to your project in an easy-to-read chart.

Free Forms

Underneath the chart in your project’s legal center are Mechanic Lien, Notice, Release and Lien Waiver forms that are applicable to your project (again, only stuff that applies to your project).    Download them with the click of a button, or don’t – they’ll always be there.

Ask A Lawyer For Free Legal Advice

Our Legal Center is not designed to be a substitute for good legal advice.   The Legal Center is providing you with information about mechanic lien laws in the project’s area, but you may still have some questions.   Well, through our partnership with Avvo.com, you can ask for legal advice from construction attorneys in your state.    The legal advice is absolutely free of charge, and you can ask your legal questions from right within our Legal Center.

Find Construction Attorneys Near Your Project

Is it time to raise the stakes and hire an attorney to collect your debt, or resolve your dispute?    Well, the Legal Center displays to you the Top 10 Construction Attorneys near the construction project. The rankings are provided by Avvo.  The Legal Center helps you hire great construction attorneys who are familiar with the laws and procedures near your project.

Deadline Explanations

The Legal Center also provides you with a list of deadlines calculated for your project, and explanations for each.

There’s More!

There’s even more to our Legal Center – we just couldn’t fit it all here.   Sign up for Free to get a Legal Center for your project, and Lien Smarter.

Great Avvo Legal Guide Available With Information on Florida Lien Laws

Florida attorney Neal Ian Sklar just this week published a really informative Legal Guide about Florida Construction Liens over at the lawyer rating website, Avvo.com.

The guide starts out by identifying the “dual purpose” of Florida’s construction lien statutes.   While the author is speaking about Florida law only, the “dual purpose” breakdown is really applicable across the country.

What is this dual purpose?

Well, on the one hand, lien statutes are crafted to protect contractors, subcontractors, suppliers and design professional’s right to get paid for work put into a project.   The law, in other words, doesn’t want a property owner to benefit from the improvements to property without paying the folks who put the time and materials therein.

You may be thinking “of course.”

The other purpose is a bit more hidden in the statutes.   That purpose is to protect property owners from having their property improperly or unreasonably encumbered.

To balance these two purposes, lien laws across the country can sometimes feel schizophrenic.

Neal’s legal guide over on Avvo discusses the Florida lien laws in this context, and he does a good job of explaining how the two purposes are served by the Florida statutes.

While lien laws vary from state-to-state, understanding the “dual purposes” of these statutes provides contractors, subcontractors, suppliers and others a big picture understanding of how these statutes work…which, although each state’s laws are different, gives them a good grasp on the general rules they’ll need to follow to successfully use the laws.

And when a state’s specific requirements are needed…consult a great legal guide like Neal’s.

Scott Wolfe Publishes Avvo Legal Guide on Miller Act Claims

Seattle based attorney and member of Wolfe Law Group, Scott Wolfe, published a Legal Guide this week on AVVO.com, a lawyer rating service.

What is a Miller Act Claim?

How do you file a Miller Act Claim?

Am I entitled to file a Miller Act Claim?

These are some of the questions answered by Scott Wolfe’s latest Legal Guide published on Avvo.com, titled “How To File A Miller Act Claim.” In the guide, Scott breaks the federal filing down into four steps, introducing the topic as follows:

If you furnished labor and/or materials to a federal construction project, and were not paid, contractors or suppliers may file a “Miller Act Claim” against the general contractor’s payment bond. You can file a claim on your own, through a filing service, or with an experienced attorney.

Click here to read all of Scott’s Legal Guides at Avvo.com.

New York Requires Service of Liens – Do You Have The Required Proof?

In New York, both public and private liens require just a little more than its mere filing.   According to New York Lien Statutes, they must also be served upon a number of parties, served in a particular and specific fashion, and proof of the service must be filed along with the lien itself (or within 30 days of filing).

You can learn about the mechanics of filing a mechanics lien from this great Avvo.com article:  Filing a Mechanics Lien in New York.

So, maybe you’ve purchased a lien form online or at your local Office Depot, or even downloaded the form on our website for free (its right here).   Filling it out and filing at the county recorder’s office is quite simple, and may not be too much trouble.   But, are you then prepared to properly deliver it to all the required parties?  And to execute an affidavit of delivery?  And to go back to the recorder and timely file your proof of delivery?

The time and detail required for these tasks can be overbearing.

And sometimes, as was indicated in the post about South Carolina’s service procedures, the process can be complicated.

At Express Lien, we file liens across the country day-in and day-out.  In New York, the cost of your lien filing includes delivery to all the required parties, maintaining proof of the delivery, and filing the proof of delivery with the recorder’s office.

You give us the key information, and we do the rest.

Plus, our industry-leading lien management and compliance system provides your company with the following at no charge:

• Manage project data and project contacts in web-based Lien Pilot
• Calculate lien deadlines
• Read the notice and lien requirements for your specific project
• Get lien law alerts when laws change in the states where you work
• Your lien documents and proof of service are stored online in your free account.

Avvo Legal Guides on Oregon and Louisiana Liens Published

Want a step-by-step guide on how to file construction or mechanic liens in Louisiana or Oregon?   Your call has been answered this weekend with the publication of Avvo Legal Guides on both these subjects, which you can view here:

How to File a Construction Lien in Oregon

How to File a Construction Lien in Louisiana

These two legal guides offer plain english explanations on how to prepare and file a construction lien in either of these states.    After reading the guide, you can visit Express Lien’s free Lien Punchlist & Forms center, where you can download more information about on the subject, and even download free PDF-fillable lien forms.

Want to dot your i’s and cross your t’s, and rest easy knowing your document will get filed?   Consider using the Express Lien service to prepare your lien, file and serve it, and then store it online for your records.

The two above-listed legal guides were written and published by Scott Wolfe Jr., who is the founder of Express Lien and the company’s President.   Separate from Express Lien, Scott is a practicing construction attorney in Washington, Oregon and Louisiana, with his construction practice the Wolfe Law Group.

He previously published a similar legal article on Avvo.com about filing construction liens in Washington, which you can read here.

How to Challenge an Improperly Filed Construction Lien

At Express Lien, we’re usually helping companies get construction liens on the books.   However, sometimes, your company may actually require the opposite:  getting an improperly filed construction lien off the books.

Co-founder of Express Lien, Inc., Scott Wolfe, is a construction attorney in Seattle, WA and New Orleans, LA, and he recently published two legal guides on the attorney rating website, Avvo.com.   The two articles discuss how to dispute a construction lien in Louisiana and Washington state.

Here are links to the articles:

• How To Dispute A Construction Lien in Louisiana
• How To Dispute a Construction Lien in Washington State

The article even points readers to a free template letter demanding the cancellation of an improperly filed lien.

What makes a lien invalid?  Read about common filing mistakes right here on the construction lien blog.

And avoid making common filing errors by having Express Lien prepare and file your document.

Lien Smarter…Get Paid.

Washington Construction Lien Information at Avvo.com

The lawyer rating website, Avvo.com, has just published two “Legal Guides” related to construction liens and the filing of construction liens in Washington state.