Legal Question in Construction Law in Maryland

The Maryland Contract Lien Act does provide protection for the subs in way that MAY permit them to place liens on your house. However, you may have legal and/or practical defenses and strategies to minimize your risk of such lien. For example, what was the cost of the entire contract? What was the approximate appraised value of your home in the current market prior to the contract work? The subs can only get a lien if the entire job "improved" the property by a certain percentage of its value. How much equity is there in your home? (diff between outstanding mortgage and current approx. appraised value). If there is littel equity, it may not be worth it for subs to spend money on liens (or they may negotiate small payments).

Unfortunatley, this can be a tricky area of the law. You should "lean" heavily on your general contractor to pay everyone and to give you "lien releases" from every sub ASAP. If you can't get that done right away (or if the general has already proven unresponsive) then you should contact an experienced attorney to assist you in getting everything worked out as well as you can.

Feel free to give me a call if you want to chat about your options.