Legal Question in Business Law in California

Re: material breach of contract

Breaches of contract are often classified as to whether they are relatively unimportant or are serious and affect a party's rights to the point where the non-breaching party is justified in suspending performance and/or bringing a lawsuit for the breach.

For example, if I sign a contract with Joe to paint my house, and the contract calls for Joe to show up at 8 a.m. Monday ready to start work, and he doesn't show up until 8:12 a.m., that would not be such a material breach that I could kick him off the job for breaching the contract and refuse to allow him to paint, and refuse to pay him.

On the other hand, if Joe doesn't show up until noon Wednesday, I may be justified in replacing him and refusing to pay him, especially if the contract said "time is of the essence" or "failure to start on time is a material breach."

Where do courts draw the line between a minor breach and a material breach? This gets litigated a lot, and there is no so-called "bright line" dividing one from the other - the judge will apply common sense and a general understanding of what warrants the non-breaching party's suspension of its performance and treating the contract as fatally breached.

When the breach has to do with payment, an advance payment requirement may be treated as a "condition precedent" and the party to be paid may refuse to perform until paid.

In your case, the studio is probably trying to say that it will not deliver any photos until it gets the final payment. If the final payment is due before the wedding (which sounds like a bad deal, by the way), it would mean the photographer may not even show up, the payment being a condition precedent to the studio's contractual duty to show up and take pictures.

Re: material breach of contract

It means payment must be made in full or there will be a suit filed, or no pictures taken.

Re: material breach of contract

It means payment must be made in full or there will be a suit filed, and/or no pictures taken.