Rehab - Contractor Nightmare

[Cheyenne Davis]

The company I work with just made a big rehabbing mistake and I figured I'd share, since it seems like it could happen to any of us. Here's a brief summary: Closed on a house to rehab, signed a contract with a guy who was hired to do the rehab (scope of work contract which came from fileplace on this site), gave him a check for 2k to get started and now he has caused the check and disappeared. We had the police out today to file a report and press charges, only to find out that we can't file charges because we signed a contract. It's civil now. The officer did say that there is a "loophole" which will allow charges to be filed, but we have to successfully sue he guy in civil court first. If anybody has some good advice, I'd love to hear it (unleSs it's don't be so stupid next time :). Btw, this was a handyman, not a GC, as the work to be done was minor cosmetics.

[Shawn Thom]

I've had it happen.  I try to find GCs that will take credit cards now so I can attempt to get charges reversed if they bail.