MARC A. FORT, APPELLANT,
v.
MANUEL B. LOPEZ, ET AL., APPELLEES
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A Florida appellate court affirmed that a contractor seeking to foreclose a mechanics' lien must deliver a required affidavit to the owner as a condition precedent to perfecting the lien, and failure to allege and prove such delivery in the complaint fails to state a cause of action. The court rejected the contractor's argument that the owner's failure to record a notice of commencement relieved the contractor of this statutory obligation.
Delivery of the required contractor's affidavit is a condition precedent to perfecting a mechanics' lien that must be alleged in the complaint. A complaint that fails to allege delivery of the contractor's affidavit fails to state a cause of action. The owners' failure to record a notice of commencement does not relieve the contractor from the consequences of failing to deliver the required affidavit.
[1] Delivery of a contractor's affidavit is a condition precedent to the perfection of a contractor's mechanics' lien.
[2] A complaint to foreclose a mechanics' lien must allege the delivery of the contractor's affidavit to state a cause of action.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“The contractor shall have no lien or right of action against the owner for labor, services, or materials furnished under the direct contract while in default for not giving the owner the affidavit.”
Establishes the statutory consequence of failing to deliver the required contractor's affidavit
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceFort, a direct contract contractor, brought an action to establish and foreclose a mechanics' lien against owners Manuel B. Lopez and others. The tria…
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COWART, Judge.
Sections 713.05 and 713.06(3)(d), Florida Statutes, provide that when final payment under a direct contract becomes due the contractor must give the owner an affidavit that all lienors have been paid or naming unpaid lienors and the amounts due. Section 713.06(3)(d)l., Florida Statutes, provides in part:
The contractor shall have no lien or right of action against the owner for labor, services, or materials furnished under the direct contract while in default for not giving the owner the affidavit.
Under this statutory provision, delivery of the required contractor’s affidavit is a condition precedent to the perfection of a mechanics’ lien in favor of the contractor, the occurrence of which must be alleged in the complaint in every action brought by a direct contract contractor to establish and foreclose a mechanics’ lien. The failure to provide such contractor’s lien is not a condition subsequent which must be asserted by the defendant owner as an affirmative defense. A complaint in an action by a contractor in privity with the owner, to establish and foreclose a mechanics’ lien which does not allege the delivery of the contractor’s affidavit, fails to state a cause of action.1
We further hold that the failure of the owners to record a notice of commencement as required by section 713.13(l)(a), Florida Statutes, does not relieve the contractor with privity from the consequences of failure to deliver the contractor’s affidavit required by sections 713.05 and 713.-06(3)(d), Florida Statutes. See Stancil v. Gardner, 192 So. 2d 340 (Fla. 2d DCA 1966); Babe’s Plumbing, Inc. v. Maier, 194 So. 2d 666 (Fla. 2d DCA 1966); see also, 1 Rakusin, Florida Mechanics’ Lien Manual —Ch. 10 pp. 30-33 (1974).
We affirm the trial court’s order directing a verdict in favor of the owners on a count asserting a mechanics’ lien for failure of the contractor under a direct contract to timely serve a contractor's affidavit and to allege and prove such service.
AFFIRM.
PETERSON and GRIFFIN, JJ., concur. . Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.120(c) authorizes a pleading to aver generally that all conditions precedent have been performed or have occurred. In this action the one year period provided in section 713.22, Florida Statutes, for the bringing of an action to foreclose the mechanics’ lien ran before the landowners Lopez raised the issue that the contractor had not served the required contractor's affidavit, therefore, it was too late for the contractor to file the affidavit. The contractor attempted to claim some type of waiver or estoppel results from the owners’ delay in raising the failure of this condition precedent. We do not agree. Under our adversary system of litigation, it is the responsibility of counsel initiating the action to know of all conditions precedent to recovery and to be able to prove their performance or occurrence and not the obligation of defense counsel to call insufficiencies to his opponent’s attention within such time as will permit the timely performance of the condition precedent.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
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Rivera v. Hammer Head Constr. & Dev., 14 So. 3d 1190 (Fla. 5th DCA 2009)…contractor shall have no lien or right of action against the owner for labor, services, or materials furnished under the direct contract while in default for not giving the owner the affidavit....” Relying on this Court’s decision in Fort v. Lopez, 580 So. 2d 227 (Fla. 5th DCA 1991), Rivera argues that Hammer Head’s failure to provide a final payment affidavit is fatal to its claim. In Fort, we wrote: [Delivery of the required contractor’s affidavit is a condition precedent to the perfection of a mechanics’…
Authorities Cited
- Babe's Plumbing, Inc. v. Emil P. Maier and Hildegarde M. Maier, 194 So. 2d 666 (Fla. 2d DCA 1966)
- Stancil v. Gardner, 192 So. 2d 340 (Fla. 2d DCA 1966)