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Can I file a lien in this situation?

Hi! I am a GC and I agreed to a deal with a city urban renewal agency i New Jersey to provide labor/materials to a blighted property that had been foreclosed upon under the condition that the ownership transfers to me when I am done. Now that I have furnished work and labor as agreed upon, they wont give me the property so I need to start the process of filing a lien/claim Is this a public job, a commercial job, or a residential job? How do I proceed here?

1 reply

Jan 26, 2021

Was the contract publicly bid? Your contract should indicate who owns the property, and if it is a public agency, then it would be a public job for lien purposes. If your contract calls for payment solely in the form of the transfer of property, then a lien becomes more complicated, because typically liens are based on the amount of money owed based on a contract price. In addition, public liens do not actually tie up the public property itself, but instead attach to the public funds that would be used to pay an outstanding balance to a contractor. All of this should be reviewed and considered before a lien is filed, because it may not serve your purposes. If you believe the public entity might sell the property to another entity, then you may need to pursue a lawsuit to tie the property up while the ultimate claim is resolved.

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