Yes.  Georgia requires that property owners or the owner’s agent or the general contractor records a notice of commencement on all construction jobs in the state.  If the Georgia notice of commencement is not timely recorded and properly completed, the owner and property will be exposed to the risk of surprise mechanic liens.

It’s also important to note that in addition to the filing of the notice of commencement, the property owner/contractor is also required to post a copy of the NOC on the job site itself.

Georgia requires that the notice of commencement get filed by the property owner, the owner’s agent, or the general contractor.  The law does not get picky about which party must actually file it.

The owner, contractor, and any of their agents should coordinate and be clear about who will actually get this document recorded, and who will verify that the document gets displayed at the job site. Complying with the NOC requirement is extremely important to both the owner and the contractor, and so it would be unfortunate to slip up on meeting this requirement because each party thought the other was going to handle it.

Georgia Notices of Commencement must be filed “Not later than 15 days after the contractor physically commences work on the property.”

There is nothing in the law suggesting that a NOC can be filed too early, and therefore, once you know that the job is going to start and all of the required NOC information, it’s a good idea to get this notice recorded sooner than later.

It’s very, very important that the notice of commencement for Georgia projects get filed on time. NOCs that are filed late are invalid and do not have the desired legal effects!

The Georgia statute has this to say about where the Georgia notice of commencement must be filed:  “…shall be filed…with the clerk of the superior court in the county in which the project is located. A copy of the Notice of Commencement shall be posted on the project site”

This is requiring 2 different steps to get the notice of commencement properly filed.

1. Getting it Filed

Actually delivering it to the clerk of the superior court office in the county where the construction project is located. The actual office may change from county-to-county, and so you’ll need to investigate this. Generally speaking, this information is easy to find. You can also file your Georgia Notice of Commencement electronically here.

2.  Getting it Posted

The second part of the requirement is that property owners & contractors must make sure that the notice of commencement document is displayed at the project job site.

Failing at either one of these requirements is a NOC failure and can have negative legal implications.

A Georgia notice of commencement must include the following information:

1. The name, address, and telephone number of the contractor;
2. The name and location of the project being constructed and the legal description of the property upon which the improvements are being made;
3. The name and address of the true owner of the property;
4. The name and address of the person other than the owner at whose instance the improvements are being made, if not the true owner of the property;
5. The name and the address of the surety for the performance and payment bonds, if any; &,
6. The name and address of the construction lender, if any.

Further, Georgia courts have specifically held that certain information is essential (include the identity of the true property owner, the legal description of the property, and the name and contact information of the construction lender). If any of that information is missing, the notice is ineffective and no participants are required to send a preliminary notice prior to claiming a lien.

Some states have a concept known as an “owner designee” which allows the property owner to appoint some third party as their agent to receive notices and otherwise help manage the construction payment process. Generally speaking, this concept does not exist in Georgia. The NOC form requirements do not have any specific area where the owner can appoint any such agent.

However, the owner may be able to optimize the process of receiving notices through the Notice of Commencement.  The Cobb Law Group in Georgia has a great tip about this in their “3 Big Tips for Using A Georgia Notice of Commencement to Your Advantage.”  One of those tips refers to this:

Include a Specific Recipient at the Owner’s Office: [Third tier subcontractors and suppliers must send their NTOs to the address of the…Owner as set forth in the Notice of Commencement. Virtually, everyone just lists their addresses without designating a proper employee to handle/review/log the notices. Thus, a proper NTO may end up (and stay on) the desk of a receptionist who doesn’t know where to send it. If you add the appropriate person’s name as an ATTENTION line…then the proper NTO will be received and you’ll know from whom to require lien waivers]….requently these remain on a receptionist’s desk and are not given to the person who will be responsible for checking to make sure that the general contractor has received all of its proper lien waivers from the lower-tier subs and suppliers;

It’s important that everyone on the job is paid. If anyone goes unpaid on the project — including all laborers, subcontractors, suppliers, and vendors — the owner could ultimately be responsible for paying twice for the same work, and lenders could have the title of the property compromised!  This, of course, is highly undesirable.

And accordingly, property owners and general contractors (and, if applicable, construction lenders) must be extremely careful when distributing money on a construction project.

Before Georgia passed its Notice of Commencement requirements, property owners, lenders, and general contractors complained that they could not keep track of who was on the job and who wasn’t, could not collect all the required lien waivers, and therefore, could not keep the property free of liens. These parties would frequently get surprised by lien claims.

The Notice of Commencement process helps with this, and creates an extreme benefit for property owners, lenders, and general contractors.

When the NOC is not filed, no one on the job needs to notify the owner or contractor that they are there. Any sub or supplier, therefore, can pop up at any time and file a lien. Even if the owner already paid the GC, and even if the owner didn’t even know that this sub/supplier existed!

When the NOC is filed, though, subs and suppliers cannot file a mechanics lien unless they first delivered a Notice to Contractor (i.e. a preliminary notice) to the owner and contractor.

This makes it extremely easier for owners, lenders, and contractors to mitigate the risk of surprise liens and paying twice.

The owner/lender/contractor must still make sure that all subs & suppliers get paid, and therefore, that they collect lien waivers from all of the required parties. We explore how to do this in the Georgia Notice of Commencement Checklist & Lien Risk Guide For Owners.

Yes.  In two ways.

First, notices of commencement must be displayed at the job site. This is a strict requirement of the statue, and not displaying the NOC at the job site could invalidate the entire thing!

Second, there is a specific requirement in the Georgia statutes that general contractors must “give a copy of the Notice of Commencement to any subcontractor, materialman, or person who makes a written request of the contractor.”

The general contractor must respond to this request within 10 calendar days!  And the consequences of not replying and not replying on time is severe. According to the statute, failing to reply on time will “render the provision of this Code section inapplicable to the subcontractor, materialman, or person making the request.”

Property owners ought to be careful that their GCs are organized enough to respond appropriately to these requests!

No.

If you file your NOC on time in Georgia your job is done. The NOC will not expire and will protect you throughout the entire project.

No. There is not a requirement that the NOC needs to be notarized in Georgia.

No, the notice of commencement in Georgia does not need to be terminated or released, and there is no process for filing a “Notice of Completion” or any other document to signify that the project has been completed.

Yes!

Generally speaking, if you’re a subcontractor or supplier to a construction job in Georgia, you should always send a preliminary notice (called a Notice to Contractor). It’s just a good practice, and it makes sure that you are definitely protected.

However, technically speaking, you only have to deliver this notice if a notice of commencement was properly and timely filed on the project.  Accordingly, the NOC requirement does affect your preliminary notice requirements, despite the fact that best practice dictates sending a preliminary notice even when it may not be strictly required.

There are a few places where you can find the Georgia Notice of Commencement.

First — The Georgia law requires that the property owner or general contractor post the notice of commencement conspicuously on the job site before the project begins.  So, if you’re a contractor that is actually working on the job site, you should be able to find the NOC somewhere on the job site itself.

Second — The Georgia law has a specific process by which you can request a copy of the NOC from the general contractor.  It’s a really good practice to always do this because it puts you in an excellent legal position.  According to the GA statutes, general contractors must “give a copy of the Notice of Commencement to any subcontractor, materialman, or person who makes a written request of the contractor.”  The general contractor must respond to this request within 10 calendar days!  And the consequences of not replying and not replying on time is severe. According to the statute, failing to reply on time will “render the provision of this Code section inapplicable to the subcontractor, materialman, or person making the request.”

Third – You can check with the clerk of the superior court office in the county where the construction project is located.  This is where the NOC should be filed, and you should be able to obtain a copy from them directly. Unfortunately, because of county indexing practices and the bad customer service at county recorder offices,  the NOCs can be hard to find sometimes, And, if a NOC was not filed on the job, it may be difficult to know this for sure.

For a more detailed discussion of this, see our article:  How to Find the Notice of Commencement for a Georgia Construction Project.

Yes!

Georgia does require notices of commencement on public jobs. There are a few differences in how this works from the private jobs requirements, but generally speaking, the NOC process works very much the same.

On private jobs, NOCs are filed by the owner or the general contractor. However, on public jobs, the NOC requirement is exclusively for the general contractor (i.e. the “contractor furnishing the payment bond or security deposit”).

Just like on private jobs, the general contractor needs to “post on the public works construction [job] site” itself the notice of commencement, and file it with the clerk of the superior court in the county in which the site is located.

On public jobs in Georgia, the Notice of Commencement must be filed “no later than 15 days after the contractor physically commences work on the project.”  It is important that these documents get filed on time.