Comments on Legal Tips & Commentary: California Mechanic's Lien Tips

We are undergoig construction on our house and hav...

2011-05-19T18:35:52.705-07:00

We are undergoig construction on our house and have recently fired our contractor for breach of contract. (He did not want to pay his subcontractors and provide us lien releases even though we paid our contractor all payments per contract.). However, the lumber supplier is threatening us with a lien if we don't pay the remaing balance which we have already paid to our GC. I am not disputing whether or not we need to pay the lumber supplier (he supposedly filed a 20 day prelim that we never received which I think our GC intercepted the USPS notice and never let us know.). I want to know how much of the invoices provided by the supplier are we legally responsible for? I have read that we are only responsible for material delivered to our property? Is this correct. I have seen charges such as a skilsaw and framing hammer. Why should us, the owner be responsible for this payment?

Thanks

I'm a 1st time homeowner and I am struggling t...

2011-03-18T13:31:22.109-07:00

I'm a 1st time homeowner and I am struggling trying to figure out this whole Mechanic's Lien process. It appears that once a Mechanic's Lien is filed that the lien claimant has 90 days to file to foreclose on property unless granted extension but only good for up to 1 yr. Does this mean that all Mechanic's Liens are actually valid for 1 year? or can they re-file new mechanic's liens randomly for same work? When is the actual lien period over for the lien claimant? When can the homeowner request that this lien be released without any further negative action from the lien claimant?

What happens if the contractor drops out of the jo...

2011-02-26T19:16:25.361-08:00

What happens if the contractor drops out of the job and quit....can he place a mechanical lien? Please advise. Thank you
Adam

I went to file a lien and put "labor and mate...

2010-11-12T02:37:22.794-08:00

I went to file a lien and put "labor and materials" for what the money was owed for. The clerk stated that they do not accept mechanic's liens for "labor and materials".

I live in Orange County, California. What specifically should be put in the spot for "labor and materials" on the lien form? Do I need to be very specific?

i clean swimming pools for a living.one of my cust...

2009-07-17T20:45:57.380-07:00

i clean swimming pools for a living.one of my customers had hired me for services,i had sent a contract out to him via email,and soon there after i started servicing his pool in good faith i started the route,a few weeks had gone by,and he didint sign and send contract back,i then sent him a bill,and he sent me to hell stateing he was not going to pay a dime Can i put a lien on his property?

We are a contractor performing work for a company ...

2009-06-25T11:59:08.309-07:00

We are a contractor performing work for a company facing financial difficulties. We submitted three progress billings with conditional lien releases which have not been paid. We are now submitting our retention billing for final payment. The question is should the conditional lien release upon final payment be only for the amount of the final retention payment or should it include the unpaid progress payments as well as the final retention?

I had hired a struc. engineer through a friend som...

2009-06-13T00:46:04.313-07:00

I had hired a struc. engineer through a friend sometime in March 2007. The struc. engineer is based in canada and we live in california. The friend told us that the work would be done for $2500. He was supposed to complete the work in a week, thats the reason we went all the way to get the work done from canada. But this guy took 4-5 months to complete the work, and when we submitted the plans to city, there were lot of flaws. We were so frustrated with this guy that we hired another local guy and fired him.
We are still under the construction process and this guy now comes up and says that he had a contract with our friend for $3500 and since he did extra work, the total amount is $8500 and since he didnot complete the whole work he will charge us $7000.
We donot know what work he is talking about and how this $7000 figure has come, we have told him that out of $2500, we are ready to pay him $1500, since he didnot complete the work.
But he says he will file a lien on us.
Can he do it? We have no paperwork ever signed with him, but we did use his drawings to submit in city for approval but later withdrew them and hired another engineer to redo the work.
Please advise what should we do??

We are a door manufacturer who supplied a builder/...

2009-04-08T13:21:00.000-07:00

We are a door manufacturer who supplied a builder/developer (who is also an attorney) doors for a new spec home that he was building.

He has an outstanding balance of almost $5,000.00.

Our company does not file 20 day notices giving us the option of liening later if necessary.

This "customer" has not made payment on this balance since our last billing in/about Sept. of last year.

We were recently contacted by him with what I believe to be a "scheme".

He wants us to sign an Unconditional Waiver and release upon Final Payment, and he wants us to sign a Release of Claims.

Also included was a brief letter explaining that he has agreed to allow our Mechanic's lien to be recorded even though it is unenforceable and untimely on the condition we sign the two documents.

It also says that he is trying to facilitate the payment of our lien in some pro-rata fashion from any proceeds avaiable after the close of escrow and that we have agreed to accept our share of whatever sums might remain after the loans and the HOA are paid.

Here's the kicker, he gives us the email address to a woman who will charge us $150 to file and record our lien.

I'm not educated in the legal system in the slightest, but to me, by signing the Unconditional and the Release of Claims means he doesn't owe us anything to begin with, then to pay someone $150 for something that I think we can file ourselves for free or close to nothing is ridiculous!

Please advise!

Hi Carl, We had a contractor abandoned our hillsid...

2008-11-21T16:22:00.000-08:00

Hi Carl, We had a contractor abandoned our hillside foundation project as of 9/30/08. We received a call from a supplier wanting to file the actual lien $18,360 on our property now who sent us a prelim notice on 7/23/08 for steel bar & hardware for $23,000. Most of the $18,360 was for monthly equipment rental fee and also the contractor did not return the rented equipment hence $7400 was charged for the value of the equipments.

1.Can the supplier file the lien for equipment although the prelim only states for steel bar & hardware?

2.What can we do? The contractor has taken more money than work done, and has not return rental equipments, and has filed to dissolve the corp. and filed bankruptcy?

Please advise. Thank you!
-Anne

I am a licensed contractor in Kern County CA &...

2008-10-14T19:54:00.000-07:00

I am a licensed contractor in Kern County CA & until recently was engaged on a time & material based tenant improvement for an existing client of 4 years. The last week of the job, as we were within 8 hours of completion (on a project totaling just over 80k) the client threw my employee off the property and threatened to sue me fr overcharging. He paid us weekly for almost 3 months and still owes us approx. $4500, mostly for labor. I was renting a storage container from the client which was placed on my property since around October last year. Upon his threats, I called to cancel the rental agreement and also wrote them requesting they pick he container up. They have refused to do so, claiming I have moved it to an inaccessible location. The now claim I owe them over 60 days rent and are indicating they will file a lien on our property if I do not pay in full. They were notified after they failed to pick p the container that I would take possession under the civil code for abandoned property shortly after requesting they remove it from the property. Do I have to pay? Are they entitled to file a lien or would it be a slander on the property? Do I have any recourse for damages? The client is a long standing business owner in our small town and is know for threatening any who challenge his decisions with lawsuits. In most cases I have encountered, nobody has ever stood up to him or his family, all of whom are employed in one form or another in the business. I had heard about obtaining a bond to clear a lien as I was the subject of a homeowner who bonded out of my lien when I began contracting a few years ago.

Out of the blue, I just received a Mechanic's Lien...

2008-10-05T17:47:00.000-07:00

Out of the blue, I just received a Mechanic's Lien from a subcontractor who delivered about $1074 of stone to my home but apparently was never paid by the contractor, whom I paid in full 7 mos ago after the job was done.

1) What are my options? After screaming and kicking, will it just be easier to pay him the $1K (effectively doubly paying for this part of the job)?

2) How do I ensure the Lien gets removed?

-Jack

If a mechanic's lien is properly filed, and the fi...

2008-07-11T07:30:00.000-07:00

If a mechanic's lien is properly filed, and the filing party has to go to court to have it enforced, and is then awarded attorney's fees mandated by statute, what priority do the attorney's fees have in a bankruptcy case in California?

I am completely lost with the mechanics lien laws....

2008-07-09T18:10:00.000-07:00

I am completely lost with the mechanics lien laws. I have a billing dispute with someone who did site improvements to my property prior to building. He quit working on my job on 10/24 and filed a lien on 5/10. I have been working with his attorney to come to an agreement about what money is owed. I asked for him to provide documentation to support the monies he's claiming to date he has not.
My questions are :
1) IF we can't settle and go to court does that mean my property will be foreclosed as soon as he files and i'm going to lose my almost home?

2) Will he have to prove to the court that the work he is claiming was done? (I have serious reservations that the work he is claiming was done at all and I have proof as to that effect).

3) What happens when we go to court? All that I've read makes me believe that I haveno re-course and i'm going to lose my property.

Thank you,
MP

I've paid my contractor over $200,000 in labor exp...

2008-04-22T11:05:00.000-07:00

I've paid my contractor over $200,000 in labor expense yet the CSLB indicates that he has no employees and pays no workers comp. He has filed a mechanics lien for $24,000 against my building. Can he still be awarded a settlement even thought he does not appear to be legal?

Does ( in California) a supplier of costum designe...

2008-03-21T17:03:00.000-07:00

Does ( in California) a supplier of costum designed lighting fixtures with a written contract with the owner has to have a California Contractor's license to avail themselves to to Mechanic's Lien law and filing a Lien? Owner has paid 1/2 of the contract but has failed to pay balance on time.

My friend purchased a company in 2004 for $10,000....

2008-02-01T18:13:00.000-08:00

My friend purchased a company in 2004 for $10,000. My friend then incorporated but has always treated the business as a sole proprietorship, kind of like a personal piggy bank. He asked me to work for him as a sub-contractor (I had no license or insurance) and I said I would be happy to help him out since I had experience and aptitude in this field. It became long-term and he asked me several times to be his partner but I was preoccupied with my wife's health at the time. The business has always made as much money as it was worked, but my friend was a poor businessman and liked to spend his time and money on his toys and hobbies and let things go downhill. Soon, the checks to me for completed jobs got later and later and then dried up altogether. He then said he could not pay me if I didn't continue to work for him. Then, when he did pay me, he would pay me less than what I was owed. This last December, I sold one of his assets for him with his permission (last large asset he said he owned outright) and he gave me the money from the sale, bringing his debt to me down to ~$20,000. I offered to continue working for him but only under a signed contract. He indicated he would never consider a written contract. It wasn't long after that he stopped payment on several checks and demanded that I return some assets that, for months, he had been forcing on me in lieu of cash payment. Now the 90 days is coming up on a >$1,000 job I did on November 6th and someone told me the words "mechanic's lien" and I found this site.
Might be important:
1. No written contract ever - barely even a verbal one
2. I always emailed/faxed/hand-delivered my paperwork in a timely manner directly to my friend and had no direct billing contact with customers.
3. I have kept good records, though usually not copies. Lately I began scanning documents before submitting them.
4. The vast majority of payments from him to me lately consisted of personal checks or cash, all of which he said he would call “personal loans”, and were not company checks earmarked to pay a specific job. So he could argue that any specific job was paid, or that all jobs were paid to a certain percent, though obviously he could not say that all jobs simultaneously were paid in full.
5. I always declared every dime of income on my taxes.
6. I'm in northern California.
7. I have since decided to start my own business in the same field. A lot of previous customers have my cell number and some have called me and asked me to do work for them. So far, everyone who has called paid their bill in full long ago but I was never specifically paid in full for those jobs. However, for a few of them, I did receive specific payment for my labor but was not reimbursed for purchases or expenses.

Questions:
1. Do you think I am entitled to file a mechanic’s lien for work done in the last 90 days?
2. Do you think I was an employee or a subcontractor?
3. Am I breaking any laws if I accept his previous clients?

Gary, the law says what is says. Filing liens in b...

2007-11-18T18:07:00.000-08:00

Gary, the law says what is says. Filing liens in bad faith when you know they the lien period has expired, you could face disciplinary action against your license. Performing punch list items or minor work does not expend the time period to file the lien.

Failing to file a valid lien doesn't mean you waive to sue for payment. If you had a written contract, then you have up to 4 years from the date of the breach to file a lawsuit to collect. You could even place a judgment lien on the property if you win the case.

Finally, you cannot "take back" work that has been installed as a fixture on real property. Your remedy is to sue in court for a judgment.

it seems to me as though an easy way to circumvent...

2007-11-17T13:51:00.000-08:00

it seems to me as though an easy way to circumvent the law is to simply stall. i'm not sure why a contractor who has waited 100 days has any less right to payment than one who waited 90. For example an owner could make token payments to string a contractor about beyond the 90 days and then stop paying all together. In my case, a friend came into possession of a house and after a year of dealling with disreputable architects and contractors litterally begged me to help her finish. We were able to get it done and she paid about half of what was owed and was going to pay the other half when the house sold. Of course, the market has tanked and the house hasn't sold and while i doubt the owner ever filed any sort of completion notice, it's probably been 90 days since someone last worked on the house. Now it seems as though my willingness to be flexible and work with the owner means i'll get ripped off. Because I agreed to help, there is one less run down, vermin infested squatter's palace. Hypothetically speaking, let's assume the owner has not filed a completion or stop notice, and further assume that it became apparent a little more work was necessary. If I do that work (say a day's worth) does my 90 days start running then?

Finally, is it still legal for a workman to "take back" his work as long as no power tools are used?

California Civil Code Section 3097(h) has long req...

2007-11-15T17:44:00.000-08:00

California Civil Code Section 3097(h) has long required subcontractors to service preliminary notices on property owners when the value of the contract.

I have recently seen, in two different areas, ment...

2007-11-15T15:18:00.000-08:00

I have recently seen, in two different areas, mention of a new legal "requirement" that a preliminary notice MUST be filed on any work exceeding $400.00.
I haven't been able to substantiate this anywhere, including the CSLB website. Is this, in fact, now a mandatory filing?

No, the lien claimant has 90 calendar days to file...

2007-10-10T12:27:00.000-07:00

No, the lien claimant has 90 calendar days to file the lawsuit to perfect the lien.

I'm not sure if this is still active.

To pe...

2007-10-10T11:29:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if this is still active.

To perfect a mechanics' lein doesn't the contractor have 90 "business" days as opposed to calandar days?

Thank You

There is an expedited petition process to removed ...

2007-07-24T10:09:00.000-07:00

There is an expedited petition process to removed the lien under Section 3144 of the Civil Code. You can call my office at (619) 448-2129 if you need further assistance. I've handled a number of these types of cases.

We had a contractor provide poor and incomplete wo...

2007-07-24T10:01:00.000-07:00

We had a contractor provide poor and incomplete work back in 2003. We paid what we felt was fair with a letter stating the reasons for the partial payment including incomplete work. In a letter dated 4/04 he stated the work has been completed and demanded payment by the end of 4/04 or a lien will be placed. He placed a lien 10 months later in 2/05...well outside the legal deadline. Nothing has been done since then and he still has not removed the lien. He never filed to have the lien taken any further. It is now 2/5 years later with no activity. Can I file to have a judge remove the lien? How do I do that?

Thanks for your help.

Unless you are receiving a cashier's check, you sh...

2007-07-19T11:49:00.000-07:00

Unless you are receiving a cashier's check, you should provide them a No. 3 release when you accept the check and then provide a No. 4 release and a release of mechanic's in after the check clears.