Here's something I came across and read... I'm sure I'm not the only one to ever read something like this, and it's prbably even been talked about in this thread, but I didn't feel like reading the whole thing.
Anyway... maybe it's an option...
For example, let's say you hire a contractor to build a deck for you and the contractor hires a guy to carry the wood from the lumber yard to your house. You don't pay the contractor. The contractor can put a lien on your house. That's logical and fair. Now let's say you pay the contractor, the contractor pays the lumber yard, the contractor pays the rental company for the truck but the contractor spends the money he was going to pay the guy who helped him on hookers and blow. The sub-contractor then gets to go after not the contractor, but after YOU. Since your house is collateral against all transactions, it's your house that gets a lien put against it.
In theory if you hired a GC to build a house for you and the GC doesn't pay his crew or the suppliers you could have to pay for the house twice or you could be legally compelled to sell your house to pay the debt. You, of course, are then responsible for going after the contractor to get your money back.
If this all sounds fundamentally stupid, it gets better. According to the guy who actually filed the lien against our house (who is not a lawyer, but has filed countless liens in his life), most people simply pay the money to avoid the lien going active. It seems that what we had was called a "notification lien" it's not the same as a lien lien. The notification lien basically exists to scare you into working out a deal with the person who placed the lien if
you don't do that, they enforce the lien which is when your credit gets dinged and people can start demanding you sell your house.
Of course this all looks like a system designed to make the contractor not at all liable for their own bills and in practice it, apparently, works out that way a lot. In theory at least you have one big gun you can draw. In my state if you pay a contractor in full and they do not pay their suppliers and their crew resulting in a lien being placed against your property the contractor is guilty of felony theft by taking (as opposed to theft by fraud or murder by death). Unfortunately since a lot of the amounts we're talking about here make getting a lawyer impractical most people either don't sue or go to small claims court and never seek criminal prosecution.
Re: What happened to ethical companies?
Member #: 64104
Registered: 12/24/2008
Posted:
12
Name:
Randy
Company:
Watson
Occupation:
Installer
Location:
Midwest
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