Construction Owners & Builders Law Blog

The Real Estate and Construction Law Blog summarizes two notable court decisions upholding permits for wetlands construction issued by the U.S. Corp of Engineers.

May It Please the Court tells an eye opening story about a case in which "an insurance company issued a policy to a company in India, doing business in India, to cover work done in India for an American company" but "the policy excluded coverage for work done in India."

Washington Construction law posts a copy of a atste study of the effectiveness of using the General Contractor/Construction Manager (GC/CM) delivery system on state and local projects.

Check out this practical "how to" article in The SunHerald on how to deal with the proposed new FEMA flood zone elevation requirements. The article also discusses the Mississippi Gulf Coast home construction market.

The Online Guide to Mediation points to a collection of essays on the law as depicted in Harry Potter's World.

The answer turns on more than the labels used in the parties' construction contracts, the Mississippi Supreme Court recently held in Aladdin Construction Company, Inc. v John Hancock Life Insurance Company.

A daughter-father feud over a wedding gift triggered a lawsuit and enforcement of an oral construction contract in Simons v Jaggers, a recent Mississippi Supreme Court decision.

Subcontract flow down clauses pass through the terms and conditions of the general contract into the subcontract. Dan Hawbaker over at Construction Law Blog points out the downside of a poorly drafted flow down provision.

The Construction Contractor's Digest explains the difference between these terms and the formula for calculating each.

May It Please the Court discusses the differences.

Read the report over at Build On This. on the Ohio appellate court's decision in Dugan & Meyers Constr. Co., Inc. v. State of Ohio Dep’t of Administrative Svcs..

The Construction Risk.com Report points to a Wisconsin appellate court decision holding a contract clause permitting an architect to rely on reports from other firms does not relieve the architect of its duty to inform the owner of inadequacies in the report and the need for additional investigation.

For a cogent explanation of issues related to the potential overlap between fire and building codes, read this post over at the Code Connection.

May It Please the Court commends a new book on the pitfalls of using boilerplate in contract documents.

Here's a how to article describing the potential consequences to all parties' of failing to require proof of coverage and waiver of subrogation rights on a construction project.

Here's some good advice from the National Association of Home Builders on drafting a drafting a binding arbitration clause for non-commercial building projects.

The mandatory arbitration clause in the American Institutes of Architects' General Conditions of the Contract of Construction does not survive termination of the contract, a Florida appellate court recently ruled in Aberdeen Golf & Country Club v. Bliss Construction, Inc.

Maybe not says Jeff Boudreaux over at Louisiana Law Blog.

There's a good summary of the decision and you can download it over at the Construction Attorney Blog.

Design professionals and their errors and omissions insurers will be warned they really will be required to cover the cost of change orders resulting from design omissions if Mississippi's Bureau of Building accepts the recommendations made in a recent report by the Mississippi Legislature's PEER Committee.

The Contracts Prof Blawg discusses how the Indiana Appeals Court's decision last week in Simon Property Group, L.P. v. Brandt Construction, Inc. illustrates the difference between a contrator's breach of a contract duty to protect property from injury and breach of a promise to indemnify for loss to that property

William Langton summarizes what issues should be addressed in drafting and negotiating time extension and scheduling clauses.

To limit construction defect suits, some developers are including clauses waiving any claims if notice is not given within 30 days and clauses requiring arbitration according to the Colorado Home Owners Association Law Blog.

The distinction between Type I and Type II preliminary agreements is explained over at the Tennessee Business Litigation Law Blog.

A reminder everyone in business needs to heed from over at BizzBangBuzz Blog.

A Georgia appellate court's recent decision creates uncertainty--at least in Georgia--over the scope of "insured contract" coverage provided by commercial general liability policies ("CGL'). Ordinarily insurance policies do not protect against breach of contract claims. But when provided by the policy "insured contract" coverage protects the insured when the insured contractually assumes tort liability for bodily injury or property damage to a third party.

A subcontractor seeking to establish estoppel or waiver of a contract clause precluding prosecution of a claim unless notice is given within 21 days of the event giving rise to the claim must provide more evidence than an oral expression of concern to defeat a motion for summary judgment, according to a New York Appellate Division brought to my attention by the Contracts Prof Blog.

A New York intermediate appeals court denied a general contractors motion to enforce a pay-when-paid clause because issues of fact existed over whether the general contractor should be estopped from asserting the pay-when-paid provision.

Colorado's Governor has vetoed a bill that would have prohibited one person from requiring another person or another persons insurer or surety from indemnifying that person from its own negligence for personal injury or property damage.

It's not unusual for an owner, general contractor or design professional to modify the so called standard contract forms promulgated by the American Institute of Architects(AIA), the Associated General Contractors(AGC) and others. But historically the changes were easy to spot. Not so anymore warns Donald Gregory in the June edition of the Kegler Brown Construction Law Newsletter.

Do you recall your thoughts the first time you had to decipher one of the "standard" construction contract forms? If so, you might empathize with the California publisher of Legal Commentary who observed in a recent post:

Standard form construction contracts often include clauses limiting the amount and types of damages that can be recovered. That contract drafters can go too far is illustrated by the recent Mississippi Supreme Court decision, Pitts v Watkins, Download file, which held that a home inspector could not limit his damages for negligence to the price paid for the inspection.