Home>Levelset Community>Legal Help>I'm trying to get a legal answer of when the "countdown" for the filing a claim starts in Oregon.

I'm trying to get a legal answer of when the "countdown" for the filing a claim starts in Oregon.

Due to the fact that Oregon has the shortest preliminary notice deadline in the country, it causes issues on the time necessary to complete the processing of shipment/invoicing and then give enough time to enter the project, allow for research, and file a preliminary notice. I keep seeing that to "be safe" you should use the shipment date, which would be what we use as the invoice date, as the countdown start date. I also saw that weekends and holidays don't count towards the countdown, however, zlien doesn't work them either way so that wouldn't extend the processing time necessary. I know that certain states define "ownership" of materials being shipped transfers at different times. I don't know if that definition plays in with this deadline countdown as well.

1 reply

Sep 12, 2017

Your question and description reference the deadline for "filing a claim" and the deadline for preliminary notices. They can be looked at one at a time.

Preliminary Notice:

As you note in your question, Oregon has a very short timeline for providing preliminary notice when such notice is required. On owner-occupied residential projects, parties that did not contract directly with the owner must give the owner a Notice of Right to Lien within 8 days of the claimant's first furnishing of labor or materials to the project; on other projects, the only parties required to give the notice are material suppliers who only supplied materials and did not provide any labor.

The statute sets out the deadline as follows: "The notice of right to a lien may be given at any time during the progress of the improvement, but the notice only protects the right to perfect a lien for materials, equipment and labor or services provided after a date which is eight days, not including Saturdays, Sundays and other holidays as defined in ORS 187.010, before the notice is delivered or mailed." This has been interpreted to mean within eight working days of the start date of the work or the delivery date of the materials or equipment. Since the notice must be given "during" the improvement, using a date prior to the actual delivery may be dangerous if the work hadn't actually commenced (although, since commencement of the improvement is not defined, the shipping of materials may be enough to start the project).

Notice that is given after 8 working days from delivery of the materials is still effective for the work or materials furnished within 8 working days prior to the notice being given (and forward from that date). It's also worth noting that the notice is considered "given" to the owner upon mailing - not receipt - so that buys some time, as well.

Lien Deadline

The deadline for a lien claim to be filed, is more straight forward. The deadline is calculated from last furnishing (or completion of the project) and is the earlier of 75 days after last labor or materials furnished, or 75 days from completion of the project.

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