Home renovation or reconstruction is one of the most common subjects for litigation in the Small Claims Court. For this reason, you should consider potential litigation with your contractor preemptively. You should start gathering documents and other evidence before any dispute erupts. Hopefully, you will not need them in the future. However, if you do, think about the following items to maximize your chances in the Small Claims Court.
Dispute types
- With lengthy and complex home projects, there is lots of room for disagreement. Most frequently, there are disputes about:
- Quality of work
- Completeness of work
- Time to finish
- It would not be an exaggeration to say that the above types of disputes are hard to handle and difficult to address. The reasons for this are:
- a multiplicity of issues and facts to prove in the Small Claims Court,
- numerous technical details to sort out and, quite often,
- blatant hostility, which the parties develop for each other by the time they meet in the courtroom.
- Keeping all this in mind, it’s best to be prepared on all fronts if you have to sue a contractor who did a poor job on your home.
Contract
- The contract can include any document you have concerning your relationship with your former contractor. At a minimum, this ideally consists of a written and signed contract, as prescribed by consumer protection legislation. At least, the contract should include:
- exact legal name and address of each party,
- description of the work,
- price of the work or the way to determine the price payable for the completed work, and
- time frame within which the contractor must have completed the work.
- Of course, the more details are included, the better.
- It is best if the work description, in particular, is as precise as possible. For example, if this is a contract to paint a house, it is helpful to include the type of paint a contractor must use, the colours that should be in each room, and how the contractor should paint the trim.
- It is usually implied that any work must comply with the Building Code and other technical standards.
Other evidence of the agreement
In the absence of a contract or its details, it is essential to produce other evidence to substantiate what the contractor should have done, for what price, and when. The court accepts emails and sometimes witness testimony as evidence of the agreement.
Photographs
- If there is disagreement about the scope or quality of the work, you should have photographs.
- Ideally, you would have been photographing the work as it progressed. It makes sense, even if everything were going smoothly and no problems were looming.
- If you do not do it, at least be sure to photographically document the work after realizing there is an issue.
- Photographs are very eloquent and convincing evidence when you are trying to detail your complaints. They are invaluable when quality and workmanship are at issue.
Professional report
- You should support your lawsuit with the expert opinion of a professional in almost all cases.
- This means that, for example, if the claim concerns the quality of work, it is seldom enough to point out deficiencies.
- It is a regular defence to state that the work is of reasonable quality. The contractors often state that such or another issue with the work lies within acceptable and reasonable industry standards.
- It’s not like you need a professional forensic engineering report in all cases. However, it is beneficial to have on board a person with industry experience. For example, if we are discussing painting again, a qualified opinion from another professional painter would usually suffice.
- At the same time, in more complex cases, the report of an expert with higher qualifications may be a real game-changer.
Estimate
- The ultimate goal of any Small Claims Court lawsuit is to obtain monetary compensation for incomplete or poor work, and similar issues. This means that the plaintiff must clearly show how the amount of his or her claim is calculated.
- The best evidence in any renovation or construction case is an estimate by another professional contractor. Returning to our example with a deficient paint job, this may be an estimate from another painter of how much they would charge for repainting.
- If you have already fixed the deficient work before the court hearing, please provide the invoice for the actual expenses incurred.
To sum up, a paralegal can definitely help you get back some or all your damages that resulted from poor, untimely or otherwise deficient construction work. However, you should work with your paralegal to provide him or her with the tools to build your case. They include evidence of the agreement, photos of the project, an expert opinion, and a quote for repair.
Read more about dealing with a difficult contractor here, and how to get compensation for bad construction or renovation here.
