Legal Question in Construction Law in California

Re: Problems with my builder. What to do.

You may opt to send them a legal demand letter, and if that does not promote a swift out of court settlement, you may want to file a lawsuit with the appropriate court, accurately reflecting all of the damages you feel entitled. For affordable legal assistance in this area, contact us this week for a free phone consultation.

Re: Problems with my builder. What to do.

It sounds like you may have a case for construction defect, owing to your statement that others in a sub-division have similar or worse problems. You may want to consider a multi-plaintiff action against the builder. Good luck.

Re: Problems with my builder. What to do.

I wouldn't depend too much on the Contractors' License Board. Their emphasis is more on enforcing compliance with licensing requirements than quality control or adjudicating claims for damages for defective workmanship. The idea of a multi-plaintiff lawsuit to spread the costs is a good one, if the facts and defendants overlap to a significant extent, as they appear to here.

Re: Problems with my builder. What to do.

The contractors board is unlikely to offer much actual help, and certainly not very quickly. Lawyers are accustomed to dealing with these problems and getting solutions, based on the threat of litigation implicit in sending a demand letter. So, hire an attorney now, and keep in mind you may have to sue to get what you want done. If it comes to that, get the other homeowners to join you, to share and spread the costs and fees. You can do that now, to give more leverage in negotiations. The contractors should recognize that they are at higher risk with multiple claimants represented by an attorney. Contact me if interested in doing this right.

Re: Problems with my builder. What to do.

As a lawyer who has handled countless construction defect matters as well as a substantial number of issues with the CSLB, my experience has been quite different than the other attorneys. I find that the CSLB is presently fairly responsive to consumers. They had quite a backlog for a few years, but most of my clients have been relatively pleased in the past year or two. Under some circumstances, the CSLB will also hire and pay for an expert to check out the construction. Their time to resolution is usually far faster than litigation. Most defect litigation becomes complex as the subcontractors all start pointing the fingers every which way and sue each other. I find that you can only rarely resolve these types of cases in less than a year. The more common scenario is two years, or even more.

I find that demand letters are of only minimal value in getting actual dollars out of a contractor. The response I generally see is a letter back blaming someone else, pleading poverty or agreeing to do some work to fix the problem. Having the same contractor do the fix is a mixed bag. If it has gotten to the point where you have to hire a lawyer to demand that the problems get fixed suggests that the guy is incompetent. A responsible contractor would have handled the problems long ago.

You may also want to make a claim against his license bond. This is a limited source (usually $10,000), but can get you going. Of greater interest is the immediate pressure the bonding company will put on the contractor to resolve the problem.

Lawyers are ridiculously expensive (although, if the case is big enough, there are lawyers who will take it on a contingent basis) and it is a rare homeowner who can stomach all the stress of litigation. Try the CSLB and the license bond first. If they don't resolve the problem, then go lawyer hunting. This is, however, a fairly specialized area of law, so interview a number of lawyers and make sure that they understand construction law.