contractor is threatening to take me to court

[Marc Shin]

I've been working with a contractor on some renovations and they are threatening to take me to court.  We do not have any signed contracts in place.  What we have is a good spreadsheet with a list of tasks, and as they perform the tasks, I've been paying him via Zelle.  I did not pay him the final amount (less that $2K) because he did not finish the job according to my satisfaction.  Can he really take me to court when we do not have any contract in place?   I live out of state from my property. What should I do?