Running the Business · Part 3
Template: the 20-day preliminary notice, with the proof-of-notice declaration
The form to send on day one of every job where you did not contract with the owner: the statutory contents, the boldface notice to the owner word for word, and the proof-of-notice declaration to fill out the same day with the mailing receipts attached. A filled-in example for a subcontract on a restaurant buildout follows the blank.
What the full lesson covers
- Send to the owner, the direct contractor, and any construction lender, within 20 days of first furnishing labor or materials; as a direct contractor with the owner, only to the lender if there is one.
- Deliver by personal delivery, or by registered, certified, or express mail, or overnight carrier; never first-class mail or email.
- Fill in the proof-of-notice declaration the day you send it and staple the receipts and tracking to it; it is the evidence in the foreclosure suit.
- Estimate the total price honestly, including likely extras.
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More lessons in Contracts and Getting Paid
- 1The home improvement contract (B&P 7159): every required element, the exact notices, and the three-day right to cancel
- 2The deposit cap: $1,000 or 10 percent, whichever is less, and progress payments that cannot exceed the work. CSLB's most common citation
- 3Service and repair contracts (B&P 7159.10): when the short form applies, what it must say, and how a service call falls out of it
- 4Subcontracts with GCs: the twelve clauses to read, what to strike, and what to negotiate
- 5Change orders: written, signed, before the work. Every time. Why verbal ones end in CSLB complaints
- 6Mechanics liens I: the 20-day preliminary notice. Miss it, lose your rights
- 7Mechanics liens II: recording deadlines, the 90-day foreclosure clock, the four statutory release forms, stop payment notices, and payment bonds on public work
- 8Collections: demand letter, lien, small claims, attorney. When each is worth it, and the one thing that makes all of them impossible
- 9Taking payment: cards, ACH, checks, cash, financing partners, and getting every dollar into the right account
- 10Case: the job that went unpaid. Where the contractor lost lien rights and how to have kept them
- 11Case: the deposit that became a citation
- 12Case: the change order that was never written
- 13Template: the home improvement contract, with every B&P 7159 notice verbatim
- 14Template: the service and repair contract (B&P 7159.10), one page, with the notices verbatim
- 15Template: the change order, one page, signed before the work
- 16Template: the 20-day preliminary notice, with the proof-of-notice declarationYou are here
- 17Template: the four statutory lien waiver and release forms (Civil Code 8132 to 8138), verbatim
- 18Template: the demand letter, homeowner version and general contractor version
- 19Template: the subcontract review checklist. Twelve clauses, three boxes each