When you work as a contractor or subcontractor on an Ohio construction project, there are certain legal protections available to you if you never receive payment. There are rules and deadlines you must adhere to if you wish to file an Ohio mechanic’s lien, which is a legal tool that prevents anyone from selling the property you worked on until you receive payment.
Per the Franklin County Law Library, when an Ohio construction project begins, the property owner has an obligation to file something called a Notice of Commencement within 10 days. The notice contains important information you may need if you decide to exert your lien rights.
The Notice of Furnishing
Once you receive word that the property owner filed a Notice of Commencement, you then need to file something called a Notice of Furnishing within 21 days of the day you first supplied labor or materials for use in the property owner’s project. If the property owner never filed a Notice of Commencement, you do not have to take this step.
The Affidavit of Mechanic’s Lien
You then may file an Affidavit of Mechanic’s Lien, but you must do so within a strict timeline. If the project for which you never received payment was residential, you have 60 days to file the mechanic’s lien. If it was for a commercial project, you have 75 days in which to do so.
You must file the mechanic’s lien within the county where you completed work or supplied materials. You also have to make sure someone either serves the property owner with the lien within 30 days or posts a copy of it conspicuously at the property where you worked or supplied goods.
