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How can I place a lien on my landlords property?

TexasMechanics LienRight to Lien

I am a tenant with a lease agreement stating that I am not allowed to remodel or change anything about the house. However, myself and the landlord came to a verbal agreement that I would be allowed to purchase the house at the end of the lease term (31 July 2020). Along with the verbal agreement to have the option to purchase we were given textual consent to do some remodelling projects by the property owners. I of course did the remodeling I was given permission for, this includes master bedroom and bath remodeling and some others. ( I have documentation for all of this including receipts and consent). I also did extensive work to clean the backyard up that was left trashed by the owners. All this and the owners decided to sell the property before the end of our lease and has no intention of paying for the added property value from the remodeling I did. I need to know before I move forward and get into legalities if I even have a chance of placing a lien on the property.

4 replies

Jun 18, 2020
Actually placing the lien on the property is not the problem. That is a matter of filing an affidavit with county wherein the property is located. The real question here is whether your potential lien is legally viable. My legal opinion is that there probably is no lien right in this instance because you did not contract with the homeowner to perform the construction. Instead, you received authorization from the homeowner to improve the rooms you wanted to improve on a home that you later intended to buy. However, a contract to perform the construction, either written or oral, with the homeowner is a prerequisite of a valid lien on the property. Now, you may have other legal claims that you could bring against the homeowner based upon his representations to you and your reliance on same, and it certainly does appear that you were taken advantage of which the law allows a remedy for, but those types of claims do not allow for a lien on the property as one of those remedies. Very best, Ben House 281-762-1377 ben@houseperron.com
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Jun 18, 2020
Ben, Can you give some possible alternative routes to remedy this situation?
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Jun 18, 2020
Give me a call and we can talk about it. 281-762-1377
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Jun 18, 2020
As  the individual that provided the work under Texas law you are in the position of a general, or sometimes referred to as the original, contractor. As such you do not need to provide the notices of a subcontractor.  However, you do need to provide a notice to the property owner.  Not clear if this would be treated as commercial or residential situation.  Being an apartment probably residential. For residential property and we can assume this was a residence, this means providing a notice filing a lien affidavit in the county records no later than the 15th day of the third month after the work was done. On the other hand, you could have a constitutional lien, sort of a unique aspect of Texas law.  Here, your lien is valid against the owner unless the owner sells the property.  So for the constitutional lien you should file an affidavit with the county showing a constitutional lien claim.   Of course all this requires that you can prove the landlord owner knew about the improvements. If the property is directly owned by a couple, knowledge of the improvements must be by both husband and wife. 
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