February 10, 2025 • 31 mins
In this episode of Jim Sells the Suncoast, Jim sits down with construction law attorney Andy Wyman of Wyman Legal Solutions to discuss the essential steps homeowners should take before (and during) major home renovation projects. From choosing the right contractor to understanding permitting requirements, Andy shares proactive tips and legal best practices that can save homeowners money—and serious headaches—down the road.
Key Highlights
- Vet Contractors Thoroughly
- Licensing & Insurance: Confirm proper state licensing for the exact scope of work (e.g., roofing, general contracting). Ensure the contractor carries workers’ compensation to protect you from liability if someone is injured on-site.
- Online Research: Read reviews, check for complaints or lawsuits, and consider hiring a lawyer to run a background check for extra peace of mind.
- Red Flags: Poor communication, high-pressure sales, or dismissing the need for a formal contract/permits can signal trouble.
- Importance of a Solid Contract
- Scope, Payment, & Timelines: Clearly define the exact work to be done, payment schedule based on milestones, and realistic completion dates.
- Attorney Review: Investing in a well-drafted contract now can prevent lengthy (and costly) legal battles later.
- Warranty & Attorney Fees Clauses: Build in provisions that spell out who pays legal fees in the event of a dispute, and clarify what happens if the workmanship or materials fail.
- Permitting & Code Compliance
- Pull Permits: Skipping permits can lead to fines, forced tear-outs, and potential disclosure issues when selling your home.
- Building Inspections: City or county inspections confirm minimum code standards—not workmanship quality. If you want a detailed eye, consider an independent owner’s rep or additional inspectors.
- Defective Work & Legal Recourse
- Document Everything: Take photos, keep detailed notes, and save all written communications.
- Notice & Opportunity to Cure: Florida law often requires giving the contractor a chance to fix defects before you can pursue legal remedies.
- Limitations & Costs: Suing can be expensive, and general liability insurance typically won’t cover the contractor’s own faulty work—only damage caused by it. Weigh the cost of litigation against potential recovery.
- Avoiding Disaster with Major Projects
- Owner’s Representative: For large-scale or out-of-state builds, hiring an owner’s rep can help you oversee timelines, costs, and quality.
- Hurricane & Storm Repairs: After major storms, the market floods with new and out-of-state contractors—be extra vigilant about credentials to avoid scams.
What’s Next?
Thinking of a renovation, big or small? Protect your time, budget, and sanity by getting the right legal guidance up front. Contact Jim at jim.ahearn@gmail.com or visit Jim Sells the Suncoast. You can also reach Wyman Legal Solutions at
A Personal Note from Jim:
Hey there, I’m Jim Ahearn, your go-to real estate guide and host of Jim Sells The Suncoast podcast! 🎙️✨ Dreaming of Florida life? I’ve got you covered! As your dedicated buyer's agent, I’ll handle everything from walk-throughs to closing, making your home-buying journey as smooth as a Florida breeze.
Whether you're local or tuning in from afar, I’ll bring the Suncoast to you with virtual tours and expert advice. Let’s chat about your dream home and I'll connect you with all the right people to make it happen.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jim (00:00):
Hey, Suncoast.
(00:00):
Welcome.
Today.
I have Andy Wyman with me.
He is with Wyman legalsolutions.
If you have ever hadconstruction in your house,
you've done a remodel, you wantto do something big in your
house.
This is a guy to talk to.
We're going to talk today aboutdifferent things that go on some
of the pitfalls, some of thethings you can be proactive on
and some of the solutions andresources and you can utilize.
Andy, welcome.
And thank you for joining me.
Andy (00:22):
Absolutely, Jim.
It's great to be here.
Jim (00:24):
Absolutely.
So I think we all, when we getthat new house, we buy a house,
we walk in there.
The 1st thing we do is, you knowwhat?
I want to change all this stuff.
I'm going to make it mine.
I'm gonna put my stamp on it.
That isn't necessarily easy todo.
You can do paint pretty simple,but when you start moving walls
and you start moving plumbing,you start changing a lot of
things You know, we're step one.
(00:46):
What do we do?
Andy (00:48):
that's a great point and a great question.
Before you engage in a projectlike that, you really want to
have a good understanding of twothings.
The scope of what you want to doand the budget.
And it's important to have thatinformation in hand and know
what you want before you evenstart interviewing contractors
or vetting contractors orbringing other people into your
home to help you, solidify yourvision.
Jim (01:10):
Let's just jump right in.
What are some of the commonlegal issues homeowners face
during home renovations or newconstruction projects?
Andy (01:18):
Yeah.
the work that we do and havedone for many years has
primarily been litigationoriented, right?
It means you've been in alawsuit or you have a dispute
that needs to get into court inand around.
anything having to do withconstruction.
So often what that means is aproblem has developed between an
owner and a contractor regardingthe quality of the work, what
it's costing, how much time it'staking, any of those issues you
(01:39):
normally hear about.
And when clients come to us in asituation where things have gone
incredibly and horribly sidewayson them, they've usually made
two mistakes at the verybeginning of the project.
One is a practical issue and oneis a legal issue.
The practical issue isHomeowners don't know how to
hire a good contractor.
They don't know what to ask.
(02:00):
They don't know how to interviewor what they should be looking
for when they hire a contractor.
There's no criteria they put inplace.
That's the practical problem.
The legal issue then become isthey never sign a contract.
And that's where I think a lotof homeowners that those are the
two biggest decisions and piecesof what will make a successful
project and on the legal end ofit with the contract.
(02:21):
Most of them think, oh if thisis what the contractor is giving
me, I guess it's probablystandard.
Just like you would probablyadvise your clients, the best
time to hire a lawyer is beforeyou sign the contract, make sure
that, it's
Jim (02:34):
yeah,
Andy (02:35):
right.
Make sure that you've, haseverything in it that you're
expecting and that you want samething with a construction
project.
You have to get a lawyer to helpyou sign a contract that
protects you.
Jim (02:45):
And I think, you know what, you're 100 percent right.
And I can speak from experience.
I did a remodel.
When we spend a lot of money, alittle bit of money to have the
lawyer look at the contract oreven write the contract for me
up front would have been wellworth it rather than the anguish
and potential money outlay thatwe did do.
Andy (03:02):
Not necessarily.
And it's really sad.
some of the circumstances peopleget themselves into when they
don't properly vet a contractorin the 1st place.
They were the only one to followthrough and give you an
estimate, or, my brother usedthis guy and he did a good job
there.
There's so much more that goesinto it.
If it's a wrong decision, youhave the wrong person, it can
(03:22):
result in years of justheartache and lost money and it
could literally, I've had peoplewho didn't even want to live in
their house anymore after it wasall done because it's a constant
reminder of, mistakes that weremade and how they were wronged
by a contractor.
Jim (03:37):
Sure.
And the solution isn't as simpleas, Hey, let me repaint the
wall.
There's a lot that can be moved,dealt with in there.
Andy (03:44):
Absolutely.
And, 1 of the most importantthings and, when you is you need
to understand whether or notwhat you intend to do requires a
permit.
That's 1 of the basic kind ofthings.
And I always recommend tohomeowners, Okay.
Avoid those contractors who tellyou, you don't need a permit
when you really do.
Okay.
Maybe it won't, but regardlessas a homeowner, and this as well
(04:04):
as certainly as a realtor, ifyou've done work at your house
without a permit, you have anobligation to disclose that to
whoever's going to buy it.
Next.
That's something that's materialbecause it's always a code
violation to do work without apermit when you need to have a
permit and that code violationtravels with the property.
you can buy a home that hadunpermitted work.
done by the prior owner and ifthe city, the county, if they
(04:27):
want to make a big deal out ofit, when the music stops and
you're without a chair, they canmake you go through some
incredibly expensive anddestructive exercises to fix
that.
Jim (04:38):
Sure.
Let's actually dig into that alittle bit.
Cause that's something I runinto, I had a house I was
talking about with the buyer andthey were talking about the
roof.
Oh we did a new roof.
Where's the permit on the roof.
The city may come in and say,listen there's no permit.
This isn't the code to yourpoint.
We're going to charge you all ofthe fees that go along with
that.
And you have to bring it up tocode.
(04:58):
And you thought you were gettinga good deal.
Andy (05:00):
Yeah, it's definitely very much, but there's a lot of
questions to ask.
And when you're buying a housethat they claim they've done
work.
Absolutely.
Jim (05:08):
So what considerations should we take into mind when
we're selecting a contractor?
What are the things that youwould look at or you would
advise, Hey, here's what we needto look at.
And this is the bare minimumthey should be bringing.
Andy (05:19):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
There's legally speaking, right?
You want to make sure you've gotsomebody who is licensed and
insured.
That's some of the basics andnot all the work you're going to
do in your house requires a,general contractor or certain
other of the really high profilelicenses to state of Florida
issues.
But you want to make sure thatfor the work you intend to get
done, that you have people whoare licensed and that they are
(05:40):
insured, you want to make surethey have workers compensation
insurance in case one of theiremployees gets hurt while at
your house.
If they don't, you're going tobe on the hook for an injury to
one of.
One of the contractorsemployees, you want to make sure
that the company is in goodstanding with the state of
Florida.
And here's the thing.
A lot of people don't knowlicenses in the state of Florida
are given to individual peoplefor a company to do construction
(06:04):
contracting under somebody'slicense.
That person needs to what'scalled qualify the company.
They make an application to thestate so that license allows
this company to do work.
there's a lot of people outthere who don't do this the
right way, a lot of contractorsand they're technically
contractors without a license.
There's an individual there whoI would want to know the
background of, criminalbackground, bankruptcy, lawsuit
(06:27):
history of the company and theindividual.
And everything I'm describing toyou is all information that can
be found online if you knowwhere to look and then pay
attention to online reviews.
when we see these situationswhere there's contractors
spiraling out of control andthey're taking money on one job
to satisfy another job, andthey're starting to lose
financial control of theirbusiness.
Generally, you will see there'sa leading indicator of a bunch
(06:50):
of bad.
Google reviews online aboutpeople who got caught caught in
that.
So that's another thing to lookfor.
And, one of the services weprovided our firm to owners is
we vet these contractors foryou.
We will put them through, weknow where to find all the
information I just described.
And for 500, we charge people,we give them a report of all of
these things.
(07:10):
So when they tell us who they'rehiring, they have now done the
due diligence to know that allthe big basics are covered, but
I also want people not ignoreother red flags and their gut
when they meet somebody.
One thing, the biggest, what'sat the heart of all disputes
between an owner and acontractor tends to be
communication.
It tends to be that eitherexpectations are not that right
(07:34):
in the first place, or there'sCommunication styles.
Very simply, if your contractoris a poor communicator with you,
when he's trying to impress you,right?
When he's trying to sell you thejob,
Jim (07:46):
right?
Andy (07:46):
Not, he's breaking his promises.
He's not showing up when he saidhe would, or it's the simple,
Hey, I'm going to be there.
I know we have an appointment atfive o'clock.
I'm going to be more like five30.
I'll see you as a heads up.
That's all you can expect from aprofessional if that's going to
be the case.
But so many of theseContractors, they don't do that.
They have the homeowner waitingtill 536 o'clock and then they
(08:08):
just show up an hour latenothing's wrong.
Like that's an indication of theway the person runs their
business.
You don't want to be any part ofthat as the individual you're
entrusting your biggest assetand most important asset to, so
that's, if
Jim (08:22):
they're trying to oppress you and it's not impressive.
That's probably the best you'regoing to see out of them.
Andy (08:28):
Exactly.
And, avoid, people who give youhigh pressure sales tactics in
your home.
That's a difficult thing aswell.
when the contractors, areoperating with a contract and
you should always operate with acontract, if they don't, and
they say, we don't need one.
That's a red flag.
Or if they give you one and itlooks like something your 10
year old put together, like themargins are off.
(08:49):
The fonts are different.
Paragraphs aren't numbered theright way.
Misspellings I'm a big believerin how you do.
Anything is how you doeverything.
If that's the sort of attentionthat they're giving to this
contract that tells you theydon't find it to be an important
document important enough tohave it professionally prepared.
And that should tell you thatthey likewise don't Really,
(09:10):
honor their legal commitments.
So these are all things that youcan observe with your own eyes
and, be, just be, real carefulabout who you let into your
house to, to do work.
Jim (09:21):
That's great.
Andy (09:22):
Yeah, we covered that a little bit.
So those are the big things.
you also want to ask them forreferences, people they can talk
to whose work they hadsuccessful projects with.
Now, you're going to get thepeople who were of the best
results but there are thingsthat you can ask these
references other than, hey, howdo you like your.
Project, you want to understandwhat the preferred method of
(09:43):
communication was for thiscontractor, was there someone
dedicated to like at an officesomewhere you can make a call
to, if there was an issue, wasthere supervision where the
people at, they sent to yourhome, were they, were they able
to be able to communicate withthem?
Did they speak English?
A lot of times they don't, andthat's okay, but you need to
have someone there who you cancommunicate with as the owner in
case something pops up.
(10:03):
Protect your property.
Did they cover your floors whilethey were working on the kitchen
or the bathroom or drywall orwhatever it is?
Did they respect your rules?
did they leave trash lyingaround your yard?
And now your homeownersassociation is mad at you.
Like these kinds of things thatmost people won't, think to ask
is are all great questions.
So you can get an understandingof day to day.
(10:25):
Is this going to be someone youcan work with?
Jim (10:28):
okay.
If there was a mistake made, didthey, how did they correct it?
And what was the communicationand how difficult was it to get
it corrected?
Andy (10:35):
that's a great point That says a lot about the type of
person you're hiring for sure.
Jim (10:39):
Yeah, absolutely.
Mistakes can happen and they'regoing to happen, but did we
correct it?
And did we own up to it or didyou bury it and you find it as
you're cleaning up afterwards?
Yes.
So how can homeowners decipherand understand construction
contracts?
The smart way, and I'm not alawyer, so I'm not reading that
stuff, have somebody who's anexpert in that field, go through
(11:00):
and tell you, Hey, this is whatthis clause means.
This is what this paragraph istalking about, but are there
some basic things to that?
We, as a potential purchaser oftheir service.
Andy (11:11):
Sure.
So you, some of the basics in aconstruction contract are going
to be the scope of work, apayment schedule, and hopefully
some kind of timeframe withinwhich the builder is going to
finish or the contractor isgoing to complete their work.
Lots of contractors don't liketo commit to that.
(11:31):
They don't like to commit to aspecific date and I'll get calls
from clients that says that'llsay he told me.
they would be done in six weeks.
And here it is, nine monthslater.
So if something is not in, ifyou're, you have an expectation
that is not put into yourcontract you don't, you
shouldn't have that expectationthat you're going to get it or
that you can enforce it.
(11:52):
And when it comes to the scopeof work, you make sure it's
very, it has to be specific.
It's got to be thorough so that,when it tells you for this
price, you're getting thesethings.
If there's things in there thatyou're expecting to be included,
but they're not on the list,they won't be included and it's
going to cost you extra.
And there are contract, look, alot of contractors are very good
(12:13):
people and they mean but thereare contractors out there.
don't mean well, and they willnot include everything in the
price.
They give you the fixed price.
They give you because that theyable to come in as the lowest
bidder, you're more likely tohire them.
And then they hit you with allthese things that weren't
included.
That's really important.
And then on payments really youdon't want to pay too much
(12:36):
upfront.
You want to hold as much moneytowards the end of the job as
possible.
I think something that's fair isIf the payments are in a bell
curve, right?
If your first payment is 20%,your last payment should be 20%,
and there should be certainmilestones that when they're
hit, right?
That's when this money will bereleased.
And that's when this paymentwill be made.
But under, especially if there'swork being done with a permit,
(12:58):
you want to make sure your lastpayment is not due until the
contractor has passed all finalinspections.
Lots of contracts will say thatpayment is due when the work is
complete.
I don't know what that means.
I'm a lawyer and I don't knowwhat it means.
I can tell you five differentthings, complete means and you
can litigate that phrase formonths and months
Jim (13:17):
everybody's got their own definition.
And so nobody's agreeing on anyof it,
Andy (13:22):
right?
So you want to make sure it'scrystal clear when it is that
your contractor has earned hispayments under the contract.
Jim (13:27):
Then that leads into what legal recourses does a homeowner
have if a contractor fails tomeet their agreed upon timelines
or quality standards?
Andy (13:35):
Yeah, that's where things get tricky.
And that's why it's so importantto properly vet the contractor
and get a good contract because,your rights at that point will
depend on what's written intoyour contract.
if you don't have a well draftedcontract that protects you,
which is also fair to bothsides.
When things don't go as planned,you're not going to have near
(13:56):
the legal rights you think youdo.
I'm going to give you anexample.
So one thing in the state ofFlorida, everybody is
responsible for their ownattorney's fees.
This is a good point, right?
So except in one circumstancewhere if you have a contract
with somebody.
And the other side breaches itand you have to go to court, you
can put in the contract that theprevailing part prevailing in
(14:17):
that litigation could get theirfees awarded against the other
side.
If you don't have a cause likethat in your contract, and you
have to take your contractor tocourt over 50, 000, let's say,
you're going to spend 50, 000 inlegal fees fighting a 50, 000
problem happens.
All the time, right?
when that comes across my desk,I have to give you that advice.
(14:40):
I know that, you've been damagedyour 50, 000, let's say it's
really not going to be worth itfor you to go after it.
Now there are things we do tohelp people try to make good of
a bad situation without goinginto the court system.
it's different.
There's only just a few toolsavailable to me as a lawyer
without going into the courtsystem, and the court system is
slow, and it's costly, andthere's no guarantees in the
(15:05):
legal system whatsoever.
And the lawyers who do thiswork, we're not the billboard
lawyers that, hey, No recovery,no fee.
this is hourly rate lawyers andit is expensive.
So you really don't want to haveto be there if you can at all
avoid it, which is, where hiringthe right contractor is just
right.
Jim (15:21):
That's the importance of vetting up front.
they know you're not going tospend 55, 000 to get 50 back.
Andy (15:27):
That's right.
And you know what, contractorsdon't like hiring lawyers
either.
No, nobody does, but they don'twant to go into court either.
It's a tough, I have to have alot of tough conversations with
people about what's worth it andwhat's not.
And there's a lot of emotionsinvolved, as it's, Oh,
absolutely.
So they, it's a lot of hey, thisis not my fault.
That this happened to me.
It's suddenly that it becomesyour responsibility to, do what
(15:49):
you need to do to get controlback over your home and your
life and your project, whetherit's your fault or not, it's the
situation you're in.
And that's so we try to focus onhelping people get from there.
through the end of theirproject, sometimes that involves
getting some compensation backfrom the contractor.
It's a very differentconversation if you, we actually
have to go into litigation.
It's different fee structures.
(16:09):
It's, it becomes an entirelydifferent ballgame if you have
to go to court and court willnever make your contractor come
back and finish that'll onlyaward money.
So you have to fire the guy,hire somebody new who's probably
going to charge you quite a bitmore to.
Yeah.
Redo the bad work the first guydid and finish the scope of
work.
And so it's it's a bad situationto be in.
Jim (16:27):
It's a lot about being proactive and vetting upfront.
That sounds like a lot of workand sounds like a lot of money,
but the potential savings ishuge.
Andy (16:35):
Yeah.
At the very least, the vetting,we charge$500 to do it.
It's such a great investment forpeople, to at least, eliminate
the bad contractors that are outthere.
Jim (16:45):
What steps can a home homeowner take to document and
report construction defects orsubstandard workmanship?
Andy (16:51):
Yeah, so on the defects in the workmanship, you're gonna
want to take pictures.
Lots of times, we actually findthis in even the new homes that
are built by, some of the largerhome builders who are putting up
the big communities around thestate where, they've tried the
homeowner has certain defects.
And they're just not gettinganywhere under the warranty
department and some of thesehomebuilders and they come to us
(17:13):
for help.
lots of times we need to bringin an outside expert, whether
it's for windows or for flooringor whatever the air
conditioning, whatever theproblem might be, and to give an
opinion as to what needs to bedone for it to get fixed
properly.
Because what will happen is mostof those homebuilders.
When you make that complaint tothem, they're calling the
subcontractor who messed up,bringing them out to the house,
(17:36):
who is trying to find thequickest, cheapest way to
Jim (17:39):
keep
Andy (17:40):
Mold is a perfect example.
There's a right way to remediatemold and there's a wrong way.
And lots of contractors whocause mold don't like to.
Remediate it the right waybecause it's expensive.
And so they'll say, oh, it'sokay.
If we just do this when in fact,that's not okay.
And so you want someone advisingyou as the homeowner of the
right way to fix the problemsthat you're seeing and whether
(18:03):
you have to fix it yourself orwhether your builder has taken
it upon them to fix it for you,you should want a third person,
a professional telling you, yes,you should accept this.
No, you should not.
Or here's the right way to fixit.
That way you can know it'sfixed.
for good.
But certainly, pictures, video,all of that.
And don't just go and fix it andthen try to go back after the
(18:25):
contractor.
Because if you do that, yourcontractor, if he has a good
lawyer is going to say youdidn't even give us an
opportunity to fix the effect orsee it so that we can defend
ourselves.
How do we know this was reallydefective?
You ruined the evidence.
And Florida has a specificprocess you need to go through
before you could ever file alawsuit about a defect that
(18:46):
requires a notice and anopportunity to cure to the
builder.
As long as the defect is afterall the work is complete.
And if you go ahead and just fixit on your own and you don't
give them that official correctnotice, then you're shooting
yourself in the foot legallyspeaking.
Jim (19:01):
Wow.
And you're thinking, Hey, I'mjust going to take care of it
because it'll be a quick, easyfix.
They'll pay me back.
That's not the case.
No,
Andy (19:08):
no, definitely not.
Jim (19:11):
Does homeowner's insurance typically cover any kind of
damage or defect or it's reallygoing to go back to what you
have with that contractor?
Andy (19:19):
That's a great question.
Homeowner's insurance generallywill not cover defective
construction.
Not only that, A contractor'sinsurance will not cover their
defective construction either.
This is what a lot of peopledon't know about the insurance
that these contractors carry.
So here's a perfect example.
You've hired someone to replaceyour roof.
In the course of replacing, itleaks.
(19:41):
It damages your drywall, yourbaseboards, your flooring, your
ceiling, all that, right?
Their insurance, and let's sayyou, you have to get all that
fixed.
And you need a whole roof redonebecause they just did it poorly.
The contractor's insurance willcover the damage to the
baseboard and the walls and thefloor, et cetera, but will not
(20:02):
cover the cost to put a new roofon.
And the reason that is the caseis because they, the state,
these insurance companies, theydon't want the builders to, they
want the builders to do the, andthe contractors to do the best
job they can.
They don't want to just flopsomething together and say I've
got insurance to redo this and Idid it.
Like garbage and goodbye.
So the, their insurance doesn'tcover their work.
(20:24):
It covers the damage caused bytheir work.
so there's a distinction therethat a lot of people don't
realize.
So when you have a contractorwho just does bad work and he,
or he disappears on you withsome of your money, none of that
is insurable.
None, there's no insurancecompany to go after.
That's what makes recovery sodifficult for homeowners in
these situations, because.
I'm like a car accident.
(20:45):
There's usually someone withinsurance or there's insurance.
That's that their insurancegenerally won't apply to those
situations that I justdescribed.
And that's where people don'tunderstand.
Jim (20:55):
Is there anything that the homeowner can do then to go back
after that?
Or what are the next steps?
Andy (21:00):
Really what we're describing now is essentially a
breach of contract where thefirst contractor, you've paid
them 40, 000 to do your roof.
It wasn't done correctly orwhatever the reason is.
And you have an opinion thattells you need to have it
redone.
Before you do that, you have togive that notice to the first
builder.
And an opportunity to cure it.
They don't take care of it.
(21:20):
Let's say now you hire someoneelse.
And now you have to pay this newperson 60, 000.
So now you've now paid 100, 000for a roof that you should have
got for 40.
You have 60, 000 of damages.
And now you have to.
Run after this contractor to tryto get it right and through the
court system or some other ways,we can put pressure on these
(21:41):
contractors to try to, do theright thing and not be dragged
through court.
But, some of these contractors,you could drag them through
court and win and get an awardand they just bankrupt the
company.
And you're left with a piece ofpaper that isn't worth the paper
it's printed on and so it's it'sreally difficult to be made
whole if that's if this hashappened to you with a
(22:03):
contractor, And yeah, andespecially if you're doing a
big, here's a great example.
If you're doing a big project,if you're doing a renovation
that is half a million or more,or you're building a custom home
there's a person or a rolecalled an owner's
representative, and this wouldbe somebody you as an owner
would hire to be your eyes andears and deal with your builder
(22:23):
and make sure the construction'smoving along the way it should,
that When the contractor says,I'm ready for this next payment,
it's, it should be, it should,it's actually validating.
Yeah, they're validating it.
They become your, they'redealing with your builder for
you.
And it's again, unless you'redoing a project of a half a
million or more or millions ormulti millions of dollars,
probably not worth it You liveout of state and you're building
(22:45):
a home down here and you've gotnobody watching your contractor.
These are the types of, orpeople who are, maybe they've
bought a 20 million home andthey're just, they're used to
delegating these kinds of thingsto professionals.
Those that the owner's rep issuch a valuable position and
underutilized by homeowners inprojects.
I have a separate company frommy law firm.
(23:06):
It's a construction advisorycompany where we provide those
services to homeowners who mightneed them.
It's super important to havesomeone like that, who knows
what they're talking about.
Jim (23:17):
And I think that goes to what we said before that it
might be expensive, but when youlook at the percentage of the
project, it's really not thatmuch
Andy (23:25):
and it's always less expensive than having to dig
yourself out of a project that'sgone badly.
Jim (23:32):
So let me ask you a side question from what we were just
talking about.
We had these hurricanes.
We had a lot of damage, a lot ofroofs.
That might be something that,hey, I need to talk to Andy
because This guy's coming out torepair my roof.
I want to make sure I'm coveredbecause there were a lot of
scams.
There was a lot of fraud.
And of course you want it fixedbefore the next rain.
So you're walking that tightrope.
Andy (23:52):
And that's obviously very stressful for all, different
kinds of reasons for thehomeowner, particularly, you're
having to fight your insurancecompany to get the money, you
finally get it.
It's different when you get hitby a storm because this is
totally unexpected.
Lots of people don't understandtheir homeowner's insurance
coverage.
They don't understand that theyhave a bigger deductible when a
hurricane hits maybe.
And now they're out to have tocome out of pocket 000.
(24:15):
They didn't realize it was goingto be necessary.
And now they, they hand theirmoney off to a contractor who
may not be licensed, may not be,ethical contractors, good ones
are hard to come by duringperiods of hurricane.
Oh, sure.
And there are people who come infrom out of state.
And I don't want to say thatthey're all bad because they're
not, and our state could use theinflux of qualified good.
(24:38):
Labor and contractors in, in, inperiods like this.
But it's very much buyer beware.
And, you're feeling the pressureof the situation.
You're probably not living inyour home at the moment.
You're with your wife's parents,you and your kids and your dog.
And it's 10 people under oneroof.
and it tends to, encouragepeople to make bad decisions or
quick decisions or decisionswithout really, trusting, but
(25:00):
not verifying.
And so it's even more
Jim (25:02):
important to do due diligence.
Andy (25:04):
Absolutely.
Jim (25:05):
Yeah.
What kind of time limits orstatutes of limitations do we
have with Defect claims orsomething that went wrong.
Andy (25:13):
Yeah.
In Florida a breach of contracthas a 5 year statute of
limitations.
But when it comes to defects,you've got 4 years to make a
claim that arises out of aconstruction defect.
4 years from when you knew orshould have known about it.
So some defects are apparentfrom As soon as your
construction is done, some ofthem are not because some of
(25:34):
them they're behind walls orthey're in, under roofs.
So it's from 4 years fromwhenever you knew or should have
known about it to a maximum of 7years.
So you might find a defect inyear 6.
You've now got just a year leftto bring that claim.
You don't have 4 years fromthat.
point.
That actually is a statute thatwas recently revised last year.
It used to be 10 years.
(25:54):
Now it's seven years.
Jim (25:56):
Okay.
Last question here today.
How can homeowners ensurecompliance with building codes
and zoning regulations?
Obviously, you're going to wantto rely on that contractor,
which some of that's going to goback to do your due diligence,
make sure that they're vetted,they're approved, they're
licensed with the state, andthey know what they're talking
about.
Andy (26:14):
Yes, so zoning and permitting are 2 things that are
generally, will always fall backonto the homeowner zone.
Zoning is especially you need tounderstand before you sign a
contract with a contractor,whether what you're
contemplating building is withinthe use of the property.
That's the first thing youshould be always checking.
(26:35):
can you do what you want to doon this piece of property?
and then there's things thecontractor should know about
things like setbackrequirements, not building too
close to a property line, thosekinds of things.
But when it comes to permits tomake sure you're meeting
building code, that's reallywhat the building inspectors do
for the city.
And the county, when you pull apermit, they come out and all
(26:55):
they're inspecting is that.
Does this meet code?
It's a minimum standard.
Obviously, it's important, butit is only a minimum standard.
So they will let work pass.
That looks really bad and sloppybecause they're not there to
check to see that it's nice andpretty.
They're there to make sure.
That the nails are spaced theway they're supposed to be
spaced.
Jim (27:14):
work the way it's supposed to work?
Andy (27:16):
Is it to code?
That's all they care.
Is it to code?
Exactly.
Is it to code?
That's all they check on.
So that's really what thebuilding, which is why it's
really important to pull permitsbecause if you don't, then
there's no one making, doingthat.
Check to quality check, if youwill so I'd even say that, there
are people who would take outconstruction loans, right?
To pay for construction.
And these construction lendersgenerally have an inspector that
(27:39):
works for the bank who, beforethey will release money on a
draw, they come out and lay eyeson things, but they are not,
they're not there to make surethings are meeting code.
They're just saying they're justthere to say, okay, he's asking
for a payment because thedrywall is in Okay.
The drywall is in.
Okay, you can have your payment.
So they're not super helpful foryou either with your money that
(28:00):
you're borrowing from the bank.
That's where that owner'srepresentative can be really
helpful to a homeowner whodoesn't know what they're,
frankly, what they're lookingat.
Jim (28:09):
Is there any paperwork that the homeowner has that could
help them?
Obviously a survey, when theybought the house, if they have a
survey, it would show setbacksor any kind of easement that's
going through there that youdon't want to impact.
Andy (28:20):
I think it's important.
I think every homeowner shouldhave a copy of their plans for
their home.
Not all of them do.
And I know when I bought myhouse 11 years ago, it didn't
come with a set of plans.
And so I have, since then I'vejust gone to the building
department and asked for copies.
They email it to you.
But yeah, because you wannaknow, you don't know where the
load bearing walls are.
and if you have a contractorthat you're hiring who you're
(28:42):
gonna look to remove a wall orhalf a wall or whatever it is,
you want to know where the pipesare running so someone doesn't
stick a nail through it.
It's just some of the basicthings that could, avoid
problems.
To me, that's the day,
Jim (28:53):
you're still going to wind up paying for it.
Andy (28:56):
Absolutely.
Jim (28:58):
Andy, thank you so much.
I appreciate it, man.
I'd love to have you come backand do a part two, but I think
it's important that as we'regoing in, it's not just as
simple as.
You know what?
I'm going to tear down this wallbecause I watched the Property
Brothers.
Let's take the steps and gothrough and do it right.
Andy (29:12):
don't just take the sledgehammer and start knocking
cabinets off your wall.
So yeah, I would love to comeback and do a part two with you,
should any of your listenersneed help on any of this stuff,
we're in Boca Raton, but wework.
throughout the entire state.
561 361 8700.
It's our phone number.
It's the best way to get to usor our website,
weimanlegalsolutions.
com.
We have a lot of great resourceson there, videos blog posts the
(29:35):
ability to get certain freereports and, all that kind of
stuff that could really helpyou.
the red flags we were talkingabout, we have a free report on
that.
The five mistakes homeownersmake, when going into a
construction project, and thenwe have a whole bunch of free
videos and stuff that are reallyhelpful.
Jim (29:50):
Fantastic.
I'll make sure all that's in theshow notes too.
And again, thank you, Andy.
I really appreciate it.
Andy (29:54):
Yeah, Jim, this was great.
Jim (29:56):
Thank you.
Hey, Suncoast.
(00:00):
Welcome.
Today.
I have Andy Wyman with me.
He is with Wyman legalsolutions.
If you have ever hadconstruction in your house,
you've done a remodel, you wantto do something big in your
house.
This is a guy to talk to.
We're going to talk today aboutdifferent things that go on some
of the pitfalls, some of thethings you can be proactive on
and some of the solutions andresources and you can utilize.
Andy, welcome.
And thank you for joining me.
Andy (00:22):
Absolutely, Jim.
It's great to be here.
Jim (00:24):
Absolutely.
So I think we all, when we getthat new house, we buy a house,
we walk in there.
The 1st thing we do is, you knowwhat?
I want to change all this stuff.
I'm going to make it mine.
I'm gonna put my stamp on it.
That isn't necessarily easy todo.
You can do paint pretty simple,but when you start moving walls
and you start moving plumbing,you start changing a lot of
things You know, we're step one.
(00:46):
What do we do?
Andy (00:48):
that's a great point and a great question.
Before you engage in a projectlike that, you really want to
have a good understanding of twothings.
The scope of what you want to doand the budget.
And it's important to have thatinformation in hand and know
what you want before you evenstart interviewing contractors
or vetting contractors orbringing other people into your
home to help you, solidify yourvision.
Jim (01:10):
Let's just jump right in.
What are some of the commonlegal issues homeowners face
during home renovations or newconstruction projects?
Andy (01:18):
Yeah.
the work that we do and havedone for many years has
primarily been litigationoriented, right?
It means you've been in alawsuit or you have a dispute
that needs to get into court inand around.
anything having to do withconstruction.
So often what that means is aproblem has developed between an
owner and a contractor regardingthe quality of the work, what
it's costing, how much time it'staking, any of those issues you
(01:39):
normally hear about.
And when clients come to us in asituation where things have gone
incredibly and horribly sidewayson them, they've usually made
two mistakes at the verybeginning of the project.
One is a practical issue and oneis a legal issue.
The practical issue isHomeowners don't know how to
hire a good contractor.
They don't know what to ask.
(02:00):
They don't know how to interviewor what they should be looking
for when they hire a contractor.
There's no criteria they put inplace.
That's the practical problem.
The legal issue then become isthey never sign a contract.
And that's where I think a lotof homeowners that those are the
two biggest decisions and piecesof what will make a successful
project and on the legal end ofit with the contract.
(02:21):
Most of them think, oh if thisis what the contractor is giving
me, I guess it's probablystandard.
Just like you would probablyadvise your clients, the best
time to hire a lawyer is beforeyou sign the contract, make sure
that, it's
Jim (02:34):
yeah,
Andy (02:35):
right.
Make sure that you've, haseverything in it that you're
expecting and that you want samething with a construction
project.
You have to get a lawyer to helpyou sign a contract that
protects you.
Jim (02:45):
And I think, you know what, you're 100 percent right.
And I can speak from experience.
I did a remodel.
When we spend a lot of money, alittle bit of money to have the
lawyer look at the contract oreven write the contract for me
up front would have been wellworth it rather than the anguish
and potential money outlay thatwe did do.
Andy (03:02):
Not necessarily.
And it's really sad.
some of the circumstances peopleget themselves into when they
don't properly vet a contractorin the 1st place.
They were the only one to followthrough and give you an
estimate, or, my brother usedthis guy and he did a good job
there.
There's so much more that goesinto it.
If it's a wrong decision, youhave the wrong person, it can
(03:22):
result in years of justheartache and lost money and it
could literally, I've had peoplewho didn't even want to live in
their house anymore after it wasall done because it's a constant
reminder of, mistakes that weremade and how they were wronged
by a contractor.
Jim (03:37):
Sure.
And the solution isn't as simpleas, Hey, let me repaint the
wall.
There's a lot that can be moved,dealt with in there.
Andy (03:44):
Absolutely.
And, 1 of the most importantthings and, when you is you need
to understand whether or notwhat you intend to do requires a
permit.
That's 1 of the basic kind ofthings.
And I always recommend tohomeowners, Okay.
Avoid those contractors who tellyou, you don't need a permit
when you really do.
Okay.
Maybe it won't, but regardlessas a homeowner, and this as well
(04:04):
as certainly as a realtor, ifyou've done work at your house
without a permit, you have anobligation to disclose that to
whoever's going to buy it.
Next.
That's something that's materialbecause it's always a code
violation to do work without apermit when you need to have a
permit and that code violationtravels with the property.
you can buy a home that hadunpermitted work.
done by the prior owner and ifthe city, the county, if they
(04:27):
want to make a big deal out ofit, when the music stops and
you're without a chair, they canmake you go through some
incredibly expensive anddestructive exercises to fix
that.
Jim (04:38):
Sure.
Let's actually dig into that alittle bit.
Cause that's something I runinto, I had a house I was
talking about with the buyer andthey were talking about the
roof.
Oh we did a new roof.
Where's the permit on the roof.
The city may come in and say,listen there's no permit.
This isn't the code to yourpoint.
We're going to charge you all ofthe fees that go along with
that.
And you have to bring it up tocode.
(04:58):
And you thought you were gettinga good deal.
Andy (05:00):
Yeah, it's definitely very much, but there's a lot of
questions to ask.
And when you're buying a housethat they claim they've done
work.
Absolutely.
Jim (05:08):
So what considerations should we take into mind when
we're selecting a contractor?
What are the things that youwould look at or you would
advise, Hey, here's what we needto look at.
And this is the bare minimumthey should be bringing.
Andy (05:19):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
There's legally speaking, right?
You want to make sure you've gotsomebody who is licensed and
insured.
That's some of the basics andnot all the work you're going to
do in your house requires a,general contractor or certain
other of the really high profilelicenses to state of Florida
issues.
But you want to make sure thatfor the work you intend to get
done, that you have people whoare licensed and that they are
(05:40):
insured, you want to make surethey have workers compensation
insurance in case one of theiremployees gets hurt while at
your house.
If they don't, you're going tobe on the hook for an injury to
one of.
One of the contractorsemployees, you want to make sure
that the company is in goodstanding with the state of
Florida.
And here's the thing.
A lot of people don't knowlicenses in the state of Florida
are given to individual peoplefor a company to do construction
(06:04):
contracting under somebody'slicense.
That person needs to what'scalled qualify the company.
They make an application to thestate so that license allows
this company to do work.
there's a lot of people outthere who don't do this the
right way, a lot of contractorsand they're technically
contractors without a license.
There's an individual there whoI would want to know the
background of, criminalbackground, bankruptcy, lawsuit
(06:27):
history of the company and theindividual.
And everything I'm describing toyou is all information that can
be found online if you knowwhere to look and then pay
attention to online reviews.
when we see these situationswhere there's contractors
spiraling out of control andthey're taking money on one job
to satisfy another job, andthey're starting to lose
financial control of theirbusiness.
Generally, you will see there'sa leading indicator of a bunch
(06:50):
of bad.
Google reviews online aboutpeople who got caught caught in
that.
So that's another thing to lookfor.
And, one of the services weprovided our firm to owners is
we vet these contractors foryou.
We will put them through, weknow where to find all the
information I just described.
And for 500, we charge people,we give them a report of all of
these things.
(07:10):
So when they tell us who they'rehiring, they have now done the
due diligence to know that allthe big basics are covered, but
I also want people not ignoreother red flags and their gut
when they meet somebody.
One thing, the biggest, what'sat the heart of all disputes
between an owner and acontractor tends to be
communication.
It tends to be that eitherexpectations are not that right
(07:34):
in the first place, or there'sCommunication styles.
Very simply, if your contractoris a poor communicator with you,
when he's trying to impress you,right?
When he's trying to sell you thejob,
Jim (07:46):
right?
Andy (07:46):
Not, he's breaking his promises.
He's not showing up when he saidhe would, or it's the simple,
Hey, I'm going to be there.
I know we have an appointment atfive o'clock.
I'm going to be more like five30.
I'll see you as a heads up.
That's all you can expect from aprofessional if that's going to
be the case.
But so many of theseContractors, they don't do that.
They have the homeowner waitingtill 536 o'clock and then they
(08:08):
just show up an hour latenothing's wrong.
Like that's an indication of theway the person runs their
business.
You don't want to be any part ofthat as the individual you're
entrusting your biggest assetand most important asset to, so
that's, if
Jim (08:22):
they're trying to oppress you and it's not impressive.
That's probably the best you'regoing to see out of them.
Andy (08:28):
Exactly.
And, avoid, people who give youhigh pressure sales tactics in
your home.
That's a difficult thing aswell.
when the contractors, areoperating with a contract and
you should always operate with acontract, if they don't, and
they say, we don't need one.
That's a red flag.
Or if they give you one and itlooks like something your 10
year old put together, like themargins are off.
(08:49):
The fonts are different.
Paragraphs aren't numbered theright way.
Misspellings I'm a big believerin how you do.
Anything is how you doeverything.
If that's the sort of attentionthat they're giving to this
contract that tells you theydon't find it to be an important
document important enough tohave it professionally prepared.
And that should tell you thatthey likewise don't Really,
(09:10):
honor their legal commitments.
So these are all things that youcan observe with your own eyes
and, be, just be, real carefulabout who you let into your
house to, to do work.
Jim (09:21):
That's great.
Andy (09:22):
Yeah, we covered that a little bit.
So those are the big things.
you also want to ask them forreferences, people they can talk
to whose work they hadsuccessful projects with.
Now, you're going to get thepeople who were of the best
results but there are thingsthat you can ask these
references other than, hey, howdo you like your.
Project, you want to understandwhat the preferred method of
(09:43):
communication was for thiscontractor, was there someone
dedicated to like at an officesomewhere you can make a call
to, if there was an issue, wasthere supervision where the
people at, they sent to yourhome, were they, were they able
to be able to communicate withthem?
Did they speak English?
A lot of times they don't, andthat's okay, but you need to
have someone there who you cancommunicate with as the owner in
case something pops up.
(10:03):
Protect your property.
Did they cover your floors whilethey were working on the kitchen
or the bathroom or drywall orwhatever it is?
Did they respect your rules?
did they leave trash lyingaround your yard?
And now your homeownersassociation is mad at you.
Like these kinds of things thatmost people won't, think to ask
is are all great questions.
So you can get an understandingof day to day.
(10:25):
Is this going to be someone youcan work with?
Jim (10:28):
okay.
If there was a mistake made, didthey, how did they correct it?
And what was the communicationand how difficult was it to get
it corrected?
Andy (10:35):
that's a great point That says a lot about the type of
person you're hiring for sure.
Jim (10:39):
Yeah, absolutely.
Mistakes can happen and they'regoing to happen, but did we
correct it?
And did we own up to it or didyou bury it and you find it as
you're cleaning up afterwards?
Yes.
So how can homeowners decipherand understand construction
contracts?
The smart way, and I'm not alawyer, so I'm not reading that
stuff, have somebody who's anexpert in that field, go through
(11:00):
and tell you, Hey, this is whatthis clause means.
This is what this paragraph istalking about, but are there
some basic things to that?
We, as a potential purchaser oftheir service.
Andy (11:11):
Sure.
So you, some of the basics in aconstruction contract are going
to be the scope of work, apayment schedule, and hopefully
some kind of timeframe withinwhich the builder is going to
finish or the contractor isgoing to complete their work.
Lots of contractors don't liketo commit to that.
(11:31):
They don't like to commit to aspecific date and I'll get calls
from clients that says that'llsay he told me.
they would be done in six weeks.
And here it is, nine monthslater.
So if something is not in, ifyou're, you have an expectation
that is not put into yourcontract you don't, you
shouldn't have that expectationthat you're going to get it or
that you can enforce it.
(11:52):
And when it comes to the scopeof work, you make sure it's
very, it has to be specific.
It's got to be thorough so that,when it tells you for this
price, you're getting thesethings.
If there's things in there thatyou're expecting to be included,
but they're not on the list,they won't be included and it's
going to cost you extra.
And there are contract, look, alot of contractors are very good
(12:13):
people and they mean but thereare contractors out there.
don't mean well, and they willnot include everything in the
price.
They give you the fixed price.
They give you because that theyable to come in as the lowest
bidder, you're more likely tohire them.
And then they hit you with allthese things that weren't
included.
That's really important.
And then on payments really youdon't want to pay too much
(12:36):
upfront.
You want to hold as much moneytowards the end of the job as
possible.
I think something that's fair isIf the payments are in a bell
curve, right?
If your first payment is 20%,your last payment should be 20%,
and there should be certainmilestones that when they're
hit, right?
That's when this money will bereleased.
And that's when this paymentwill be made.
But under, especially if there'swork being done with a permit,
(12:58):
you want to make sure your lastpayment is not due until the
contractor has passed all finalinspections.
Lots of contracts will say thatpayment is due when the work is
complete.
I don't know what that means.
I'm a lawyer and I don't knowwhat it means.
I can tell you five differentthings, complete means and you
can litigate that phrase formonths and months
Jim (13:17):
everybody's got their own definition.
And so nobody's agreeing on anyof it,
Andy (13:22):
right?
So you want to make sure it'scrystal clear when it is that
your contractor has earned hispayments under the contract.
Jim (13:27):
Then that leads into what legal recourses does a homeowner
have if a contractor fails tomeet their agreed upon timelines
or quality standards?
Andy (13:35):
Yeah, that's where things get tricky.
And that's why it's so importantto properly vet the contractor
and get a good contract because,your rights at that point will
depend on what's written intoyour contract.
if you don't have a well draftedcontract that protects you,
which is also fair to bothsides.
When things don't go as planned,you're not going to have near
(13:56):
the legal rights you think youdo.
I'm going to give you anexample.
So one thing in the state ofFlorida, everybody is
responsible for their ownattorney's fees.
This is a good point, right?
So except in one circumstancewhere if you have a contract
with somebody.
And the other side breaches itand you have to go to court, you
can put in the contract that theprevailing part prevailing in
(14:17):
that litigation could get theirfees awarded against the other
side.
If you don't have a cause likethat in your contract, and you
have to take your contractor tocourt over 50, 000, let's say,
you're going to spend 50, 000 inlegal fees fighting a 50, 000
problem happens.
All the time, right?
when that comes across my desk,I have to give you that advice.
(14:40):
I know that, you've been damagedyour 50, 000, let's say it's
really not going to be worth itfor you to go after it.
Now there are things we do tohelp people try to make good of
a bad situation without goinginto the court system.
it's different.
There's only just a few toolsavailable to me as a lawyer
without going into the courtsystem, and the court system is
slow, and it's costly, andthere's no guarantees in the
(15:05):
legal system whatsoever.
And the lawyers who do thiswork, we're not the billboard
lawyers that, hey, No recovery,no fee.
this is hourly rate lawyers andit is expensive.
So you really don't want to haveto be there if you can at all
avoid it, which is, where hiringthe right contractor is just
right.
Jim (15:21):
That's the importance of vetting up front.
they know you're not going tospend 55, 000 to get 50 back.
Andy (15:27):
That's right.
And you know what, contractorsdon't like hiring lawyers
either.
No, nobody does, but they don'twant to go into court either.
It's a tough, I have to have alot of tough conversations with
people about what's worth it andwhat's not.
And there's a lot of emotionsinvolved, as it's, Oh,
absolutely.
So they, it's a lot of hey, thisis not my fault.
That this happened to me.
It's suddenly that it becomesyour responsibility to, do what
(15:49):
you need to do to get controlback over your home and your
life and your project, whetherit's your fault or not, it's the
situation you're in.
And that's so we try to focus onhelping people get from there.
through the end of theirproject, sometimes that involves
getting some compensation backfrom the contractor.
It's a very differentconversation if you, we actually
have to go into litigation.
It's different fee structures.
(16:09):
It's, it becomes an entirelydifferent ballgame if you have
to go to court and court willnever make your contractor come
back and finish that'll onlyaward money.
So you have to fire the guy,hire somebody new who's probably
going to charge you quite a bitmore to.
Yeah.
Redo the bad work the first guydid and finish the scope of
work.
And so it's it's a bad situationto be in.
Jim (16:27):
It's a lot about being proactive and vetting upfront.
That sounds like a lot of workand sounds like a lot of money,
but the potential savings ishuge.
Andy (16:35):
Yeah.
At the very least, the vetting,we charge$500 to do it.
It's such a great investment forpeople, to at least, eliminate
the bad contractors that are outthere.
Jim (16:45):
What steps can a home homeowner take to document and
report construction defects orsubstandard workmanship?
Andy (16:51):
Yeah, so on the defects in the workmanship, you're gonna
want to take pictures.
Lots of times, we actually findthis in even the new homes that
are built by, some of the largerhome builders who are putting up
the big communities around thestate where, they've tried the
homeowner has certain defects.
And they're just not gettinganywhere under the warranty
department and some of thesehomebuilders and they come to us
(17:13):
for help.
lots of times we need to bringin an outside expert, whether
it's for windows or for flooringor whatever the air
conditioning, whatever theproblem might be, and to give an
opinion as to what needs to bedone for it to get fixed
properly.
Because what will happen is mostof those homebuilders.
When you make that complaint tothem, they're calling the
subcontractor who messed up,bringing them out to the house,
(17:36):
who is trying to find thequickest, cheapest way to
Jim (17:39):
keep
Andy (17:40):
Mold is a perfect example.
There's a right way to remediatemold and there's a wrong way.
And lots of contractors whocause mold don't like to.
Remediate it the right waybecause it's expensive.
And so they'll say, oh, it'sokay.
If we just do this when in fact,that's not okay.
And so you want someone advisingyou as the homeowner of the
right way to fix the problemsthat you're seeing and whether
(18:03):
you have to fix it yourself orwhether your builder has taken
it upon them to fix it for you,you should want a third person,
a professional telling you, yes,you should accept this.
No, you should not.
Or here's the right way to fixit.
That way you can know it'sfixed.
for good.
But certainly, pictures, video,all of that.
And don't just go and fix it andthen try to go back after the
(18:25):
contractor.
Because if you do that, yourcontractor, if he has a good
lawyer is going to say youdidn't even give us an
opportunity to fix the effect orsee it so that we can defend
ourselves.
How do we know this was reallydefective?
You ruined the evidence.
And Florida has a specificprocess you need to go through
before you could ever file alawsuit about a defect that
(18:46):
requires a notice and anopportunity to cure to the
builder.
As long as the defect is afterall the work is complete.
And if you go ahead and just fixit on your own and you don't
give them that official correctnotice, then you're shooting
yourself in the foot legallyspeaking.
Jim (19:01):
Wow.
And you're thinking, Hey, I'mjust going to take care of it
because it'll be a quick, easyfix.
They'll pay me back.
That's not the case.
No,
Andy (19:08):
no, definitely not.
Jim (19:11):
Does homeowner's insurance typically cover any kind of
damage or defect or it's reallygoing to go back to what you
have with that contractor?
Andy (19:19):
That's a great question.
Homeowner's insurance generallywill not cover defective
construction.
Not only that, A contractor'sinsurance will not cover their
defective construction either.
This is what a lot of peopledon't know about the insurance
that these contractors carry.
So here's a perfect example.
You've hired someone to replaceyour roof.
In the course of replacing, itleaks.
(19:41):
It damages your drywall, yourbaseboards, your flooring, your
ceiling, all that, right?
Their insurance, and let's sayyou, you have to get all that
fixed.
And you need a whole roof redonebecause they just did it poorly.
The contractor's insurance willcover the damage to the
baseboard and the walls and thefloor, et cetera, but will not
(20:02):
cover the cost to put a new roofon.
And the reason that is the caseis because they, the state,
these insurance companies, theydon't want the builders to, they
want the builders to do the, andthe contractors to do the best
job they can.
They don't want to just flopsomething together and say I've
got insurance to redo this and Idid it.
Like garbage and goodbye.
So the, their insurance doesn'tcover their work.
(20:24):
It covers the damage caused bytheir work.
so there's a distinction therethat a lot of people don't
realize.
So when you have a contractorwho just does bad work and he,
or he disappears on you withsome of your money, none of that
is insurable.
None, there's no insurancecompany to go after.
That's what makes recovery sodifficult for homeowners in
these situations, because.
I'm like a car accident.
(20:45):
There's usually someone withinsurance or there's insurance.
That's that their insurancegenerally won't apply to those
situations that I justdescribed.
And that's where people don'tunderstand.
Jim (20:55):
Is there anything that the homeowner can do then to go back
after that?
Or what are the next steps?
Andy (21:00):
Really what we're describing now is essentially a
breach of contract where thefirst contractor, you've paid
them 40, 000 to do your roof.
It wasn't done correctly orwhatever the reason is.
And you have an opinion thattells you need to have it
redone.
Before you do that, you have togive that notice to the first
builder.
And an opportunity to cure it.
They don't take care of it.
(21:20):
Let's say now you hire someoneelse.
And now you have to pay this newperson 60, 000.
So now you've now paid 100, 000for a roof that you should have
got for 40.
You have 60, 000 of damages.
And now you have to.
Run after this contractor to tryto get it right and through the
court system or some other ways,we can put pressure on these
(21:41):
contractors to try to, do theright thing and not be dragged
through court.
But, some of these contractors,you could drag them through
court and win and get an awardand they just bankrupt the
company.
And you're left with a piece ofpaper that isn't worth the paper
it's printed on and so it's it'sreally difficult to be made
whole if that's if this hashappened to you with a
(22:03):
contractor, And yeah, andespecially if you're doing a
big, here's a great example.
If you're doing a big project,if you're doing a renovation
that is half a million or more,or you're building a custom home
there's a person or a rolecalled an owner's
representative, and this wouldbe somebody you as an owner
would hire to be your eyes andears and deal with your builder
(22:23):
and make sure the construction'smoving along the way it should,
that When the contractor says,I'm ready for this next payment,
it's, it should be, it should,it's actually validating.
Yeah, they're validating it.
They become your, they'redealing with your builder for
you.
And it's again, unless you'redoing a project of a half a
million or more or millions ormulti millions of dollars,
probably not worth it You liveout of state and you're building
(22:45):
a home down here and you've gotnobody watching your contractor.
These are the types of, orpeople who are, maybe they've
bought a 20 million home andthey're just, they're used to
delegating these kinds of thingsto professionals.
Those that the owner's rep issuch a valuable position and
underutilized by homeowners inprojects.
I have a separate company frommy law firm.
(23:06):
It's a construction advisorycompany where we provide those
services to homeowners who mightneed them.
It's super important to havesomeone like that, who knows
what they're talking about.
Jim (23:17):
And I think that goes to what we said before that it
might be expensive, but when youlook at the percentage of the
project, it's really not thatmuch
Andy (23:25):
and it's always less expensive than having to dig
yourself out of a project that'sgone badly.
Jim (23:32):
So let me ask you a side question from what we were just
talking about.
We had these hurricanes.
We had a lot of damage, a lot ofroofs.
That might be something that,hey, I need to talk to Andy
because This guy's coming out torepair my roof.
I want to make sure I'm coveredbecause there were a lot of
scams.
There was a lot of fraud.
And of course you want it fixedbefore the next rain.
So you're walking that tightrope.
Andy (23:52):
And that's obviously very stressful for all, different
kinds of reasons for thehomeowner, particularly, you're
having to fight your insurancecompany to get the money, you
finally get it.
It's different when you get hitby a storm because this is
totally unexpected.
Lots of people don't understandtheir homeowner's insurance
coverage.
They don't understand that theyhave a bigger deductible when a
hurricane hits maybe.
And now they're out to have tocome out of pocket 000.
(24:15):
They didn't realize it was goingto be necessary.
And now they, they hand theirmoney off to a contractor who
may not be licensed, may not be,ethical contractors, good ones
are hard to come by duringperiods of hurricane.
Oh, sure.
And there are people who come infrom out of state.
And I don't want to say thatthey're all bad because they're
not, and our state could use theinflux of qualified good.
(24:38):
Labor and contractors in, in, inperiods like this.
But it's very much buyer beware.
And, you're feeling the pressureof the situation.
You're probably not living inyour home at the moment.
You're with your wife's parents,you and your kids and your dog.
And it's 10 people under oneroof.
and it tends to, encouragepeople to make bad decisions or
quick decisions or decisionswithout really, trusting, but
(25:00):
not verifying.
And so it's even more
Jim (25:02):
important to do due diligence.
Andy (25:04):
Absolutely.
Jim (25:05):
Yeah.
What kind of time limits orstatutes of limitations do we
have with Defect claims orsomething that went wrong.
Andy (25:13):
Yeah.
In Florida a breach of contracthas a 5 year statute of
limitations.
But when it comes to defects,you've got 4 years to make a
claim that arises out of aconstruction defect.
4 years from when you knew orshould have known about it.
So some defects are apparentfrom As soon as your
construction is done, some ofthem are not because some of
(25:34):
them they're behind walls orthey're in, under roofs.
So it's from 4 years fromwhenever you knew or should have
known about it to a maximum of 7years.
So you might find a defect inyear 6.
You've now got just a year leftto bring that claim.
You don't have 4 years fromthat.
point.
That actually is a statute thatwas recently revised last year.
It used to be 10 years.
(25:54):
Now it's seven years.
Jim (25:56):
Okay.
Last question here today.
How can homeowners ensurecompliance with building codes
and zoning regulations?
Obviously, you're going to wantto rely on that contractor,
which some of that's going to goback to do your due diligence,
make sure that they're vetted,they're approved, they're
licensed with the state, andthey know what they're talking
about.
Andy (26:14):
Yes, so zoning and permitting are 2 things that are
generally, will always fall backonto the homeowner zone.
Zoning is especially you need tounderstand before you sign a
contract with a contractor,whether what you're
contemplating building is withinthe use of the property.
That's the first thing youshould be always checking.
(26:35):
can you do what you want to doon this piece of property?
and then there's things thecontractor should know about
things like setbackrequirements, not building too
close to a property line, thosekinds of things.
But when it comes to permits tomake sure you're meeting
building code, that's reallywhat the building inspectors do
for the city.
And the county, when you pull apermit, they come out and all
(26:55):
they're inspecting is that.
Does this meet code?
It's a minimum standard.
Obviously, it's important, butit is only a minimum standard.
So they will let work pass.
That looks really bad and sloppybecause they're not there to
check to see that it's nice andpretty.
They're there to make sure.
That the nails are spaced theway they're supposed to be
spaced.
Jim (27:14):
work the way it's supposed to work?
Andy (27:16):
Is it to code?
That's all they care.
Is it to code?
Exactly.
Is it to code?
That's all they check on.
So that's really what thebuilding, which is why it's
really important to pull permitsbecause if you don't, then
there's no one making, doingthat.
Check to quality check, if youwill so I'd even say that, there
are people who would take outconstruction loans, right?
To pay for construction.
And these construction lendersgenerally have an inspector that
(27:39):
works for the bank who, beforethey will release money on a
draw, they come out and lay eyeson things, but they are not,
they're not there to make surethings are meeting code.
They're just saying they're justthere to say, okay, he's asking
for a payment because thedrywall is in Okay.
The drywall is in.
Okay, you can have your payment.
So they're not super helpful foryou either with your money that
(28:00):
you're borrowing from the bank.
That's where that owner'srepresentative can be really
helpful to a homeowner whodoesn't know what they're,
frankly, what they're lookingat.
Jim (28:09):
Is there any paperwork that the homeowner has that could
help them?
Obviously a survey, when theybought the house, if they have a
survey, it would show setbacksor any kind of easement that's
going through there that youdon't want to impact.
Andy (28:20):
I think it's important.
I think every homeowner shouldhave a copy of their plans for
their home.
Not all of them do.
And I know when I bought myhouse 11 years ago, it didn't
come with a set of plans.
And so I have, since then I'vejust gone to the building
department and asked for copies.
They email it to you.
But yeah, because you wannaknow, you don't know where the
load bearing walls are.
and if you have a contractorthat you're hiring who you're
(28:42):
gonna look to remove a wall orhalf a wall or whatever it is,
you want to know where the pipesare running so someone doesn't
stick a nail through it.
It's just some of the basicthings that could, avoid
problems.
To me, that's the day,
Jim (28:53):
you're still going to wind up paying for it.
Andy (28:56):
Absolutely.
Jim (28:58):
Andy, thank you so much.
I appreciate it, man.
I'd love to have you come backand do a part two, but I think
it's important that as we'regoing in, it's not just as
simple as.
You know what?
I'm going to tear down this wallbecause I watched the Property
Brothers.
Let's take the steps and gothrough and do it right.
Andy (29:12):
don't just take the sledgehammer and start knocking
cabinets off your wall.
So yeah, I would love to comeback and do a part two with you,
should any of your listenersneed help on any of this stuff,
we're in Boca Raton, but wework.
throughout the entire state.
561 361 8700.
It's our phone number.
It's the best way to get to usor our website,
weimanlegalsolutions.
com.
We have a lot of great resourceson there, videos blog posts the
(29:35):
ability to get certain freereports and, all that kind of
stuff that could really helpyou.
the red flags we were talkingabout, we have a free report on
that.
The five mistakes homeownersmake, when going into a
construction project, and thenwe have a whole bunch of free
videos and stuff that are reallyhelpful.
Jim (29:50):
Fantastic.
I'll make sure all that's in theshow notes too.
And again, thank you, Andy.
I really appreciate it.
Andy (29:54):
Yeah, Jim, this was great.
Jim (29:56):
Thank you.
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