It’s a situation that happens much too often.
You, the homeowner hire a contractor to fix. Let’s say a roof damaged by Hurricane Harvey.
You give the contractor money.
Only to find the contractor do little to no work and vanish, like your hard earned cash.
If your home was damaged by Hurricane Harvey. Texas law is on your side.
In the Business and Commerce Code Chapter 58, it states in Disaster Remediation Contracts, "a contractor may not require a person to make full or partial payment under a contract before the work begins."
Chuck Griffin from the Texas State Roofing Company puts it in simpler terms, "after a hurricane or disaster, in a county that is declared a disaster area by the State of Texas, it is against the law for a contractor to collect funds from a customer prior to the work being done."
So what happens if a contractor doesn’t have he funds to buy the materials up front?
Griffin suggests to check the reliability of the contractor and if you are still set on the guy, buy the materials yourself.
"I tell customers if they ever do have a contractor who needs money up front for supplies, that they should buy the supplies with their credit card or go to the place and buy the supplies and then just pay him for the labor once he’s completed the job. But never give a contractor money up front to go buy supplies. He’s probably making a boat payment," said Griffin.
For more information regarding building laws in disaster areas:
http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/BC/htm/BC.58.htm
