does anyone have experience with getting an 'expert witness' ...

unfortunately my problems with the general contractor for my stoop repairs are still unresolved and i am in the process of filing a civil court case. i am wondering if anybody has some advice or experience with getting an ‘expert witness’ willing to testify if the case gets that far…. any general guidance would be much appreciated as well if there are some fellow homeowners that have had the unfortunate experience of filing a lawsuit. or advice from contractors that might have been through this sort of thing before also! thanks!

juliaalexis

in General Discussion 8 years and 9 months ago

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juliaalexis | 8 years and 9 months ago

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thanks for weighing in, Lurker. My situation seems like it was wildly unlucky when it comes to the DCA… I did a lot of research and got many quotes and settled on this guy because he was licensed, recommended and reviewed, BBB endorsed, highly touted through AngiesList and offered a clear contract that i felt was reflective of the work and transparent enough for me to understand. i checked his license status with the DCA website and even called the DCA to make sure I was understanding the license process, etc. Everyone seemed to be giving me the green light that this guy was reputable. Right away things started going a little sideways… minor things at first and then major enough that I had to complain to him and ask him to correct something. From that moment everything went downhill… He made all sorts of ridiculous suggestions (including moving my fence out onto the sidewalk to correct his spacing mistakes!) but he refused to offer any sort of discount for the errors. And in his flailing he let it slip that he was way overcharging me for everything. Everything he t ouched from there on out was way substandard – and I have his employees on recording even agreeing that the work was not properly done. When all of this started going poorly I started looking for solutions and contacted AngiesList, the BBB, and of course the DCA. It turns out that he was being investigated for all sorts of things right around the time i was hiring him but nothing was in the system yet. The DCA handed down a judgement against him for nearly half a million dollars for his business practices of taking advantage of homeowners that needed repairs after hurricane Sandy and they revoked his license and ruled that he was ineligible to ever hold a license again. But this all happened more or less on the day I signed the contract so it wasn’t in the system and now the DCA will not help me. I have spoken with the head of the DCA and he said my case has been reviewed all the way up the ladder and he personally has agreed that they will not take action to help me – even though he agrees that i got totally hosed. They are going after the guy for penalties and such but that won’t help me. The BBB found that he is in violation of their policies so they have put up warnings on his listing. AngiesList found him in violation of their policies so they suspended his advertising and privileges but they are more or less toothless so i think he has weaseled back into their graces already. And he has gone on to start using someone else’s license number and continues to work…. So my only recourse really at this point is the breach of contract – the contract is still valid even if the DCA won’t support me through their system.

Lurker | 8 years and 9 months ago

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also, for an expert witness hire an independent structural engineer, or architect, or a home inspector (or both) and offer them an appropriate hourly or lump sum so to review the work and contract and then appear in court. I’ll be you could get someone who’d charge you a day rate to appear in court and a day of labor to visit the site and read the contract.

Lurker | 8 years and 9 months ago

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I’m surprised by your experience with the DCA–we pursued a complaint, there was a period of arbitration where the contractor was given reasonable time to respond and finish work, and when he failed to do that was given notice that if he failed to make a settlement it would go to the legal dept who would assess his case and then potentially pursue sanctions including up to suspending or revoking his license. He settled on the day it was going to legal for an amount that was based on the cost of hiring another contractor. Granted we had a contract and he was licensed so that may be the issue.

eman134 | 8 years and 9 months ago

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perhaps you should spend your money on a therapist ..might be more productive for you

juliaalexis | 8 years and 9 months ago

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unfortunately the limit of the small claims process really eliminates that route as an option for me… as i mentioned in the original post i am pursuing this as a civil court case. i can accept the possibility that a judgement in my favor wouldn’t necessarily net me everything i am asking for, but it seems that getting the opportunity to explain my need for compensation for the damages and for the fulfillment of the contract etc is a better approach than limiting myself to the small claims limit – especially considering that there is no guarantee of that award either.

after some good advice here i think i will pursue this with all the documentation, contracts, recordings and such that i have and obtain some current estimates from contractors to help support the costs to remedy the situation.

slopefarm | 8 years and 9 months ago

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Well, there is Civil Court, which I believe handles up to $25k and has simpler procedures than full blown state supreme court.

Philadelphia has this country’s weirdest legal terminology, btw. praecipe, prothonotary, etc.

bk123 | 8 years and 9 months ago

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That stinks, In Philadelphia its $12,000 now.

EJR | 8 years and 9 months ago

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The max for small claims court in NYC is $5,000.

bk123 | 8 years and 9 months ago

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Just sue in small claims court for the max allowed. You do not need an expert for that.
I don’t think you will get back every penny you gave the contractor, that is not realistic.
A bill for what it took to correct/ complete the job is. Also good luck collecting if you win.
Yes the new contractor may need to appear in court, you could ask the court for guidance on that aspect, this has all been done before.

slopefarm | 8 years and 9 months ago

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You also run the risk that, even if you win, you will be unable to collect. But bored is right. Your damages, if proved, are going to be based on cost of repair and to complete work, minus some things, so just get estimates, and let those who gave estimates be possible witnesses based on their observation of conditions underlying estimate. Line between fact and expert testimony by professionals can be blurry in state court, so just make this as factual as you can.

eman134 | 8 years and 9 months ago

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you are wasting your time on a lawsuit. Put on you bigboy pants eat the loss and move on with another contractor

boredatwork | 8 years and 9 months ago

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This sounds like a horrible case, but it seems hard to estimate your true monetary damages. Do you have a contract? Can you show he is not living up to the terms?

I think the expert witness route is a loser from the start. Find a good contractor or three that you would want to work with and get good estimates on what it will cost to correct the mistakes and complete the project. At least you have some basis to understand if it makes sense to move forward with a suit.

IMHO, it will be worth the expense of hiring a lawyer to draw up the papers and have them properly served. That should not be a big expense. If you are going to small claims court, then you really dont need a lawyer, but I think the amounts in question here are above the small claims court threshold.

Nevertheless, you are unlikely to recover all of the amount already paid to him as he had legitimate expenses of materials and labor. If there is physical damage to your property that you can prove he caused, that’s legitimate.

Good luck.

juliaalexis | 8 years and 9 months ago

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thanks for the comments… i am trying to stay focused on the practical/possible solutions rather than just winning but will admit it is difficult! i have written elsewhere about the problems with this contractor but the short version is that he has made many mistakes from the beginning of the project and from the moment i brought the first mistake up he has taken the project less seriously and the quality of work has suffered. the work is still not completed (although everything is in working condition and safe as far as i can tell). at this point he has actually acknowledged the problems but will not communicate with me via phone or email and has made no efforts to actually correct the work other than admitting in writing and audio recording that the work was not properly performed and needs corrected. i have attempted to resolve things first through him directly, then through angieslist (where i hired him) and finally through the DCA and the BBB. all of the above agencies started a dialog with him and then informed me that he refused to cooperate so they had no author ity to pursue the matter any further on my behalf. the DCA is pursuing a padlock order on him but they acknowledged that those things take forever and won’t help me with the job or money anyway. at this point i have no alternative but to sue. since he has refused to finish the project, correct the problems or deliver any warranty materials and since he won’t return phone calls or email and his last text to me was threatening and profane, i feel that he has essentially not given me anything in return for what i have paid him. so i will be suing to recover the amount already paid in addition to the damage he has already caused my property. ballpark figure of around $20k. not a small amount but also not large enough in my mind to justify $5k plus for an expert witness. i was hoping that i would be able to get a contractor who understands this process to offer me estimates for finishing and/or fixing the project and then possibly be willing to back that estimate up in court if this situation came to it . and yes i understand i would need to pay the contractor an hourly fee to show up to court – never imagined it would be in the 5k range though. wow, that did not seem to come out as the ‘short’ version! sorry for the rambling… and thanks again for the comments!

slopefarm | 8 years and 9 months ago

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that sounds about right, EJR. So often I see people get focused on winning but lose track of the cost/benefit analysis. Litigation is really a business tool, and you do it to come out better than you would have if you didn’t sue. So whether it makes sense to hire an expert depends both on the cost of the expert and the value of the claim (crudely put at how much are you suing for multiplied by percentage likelihood of success). If this is a smallish claim, best to find a way to go without paying an expert — no point in winning the case to be left with nothing after you pay everyone.

EJR | 8 years and 9 months ago

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For reference, an expert witness in the legal or medical field will run about $350/hr for preparatory work and about $5,000/day if they need to testify or participate in a deposition. I have no concept what an expert witness-contractor would cost, but the gist of the matter is that it’s expensive to ask people to appear in court on your behalf.

slopefarm | 8 years and 9 months ago

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Just how much money are you seeking? You may find the cost of hiring an expert to eat too much into any anticipated recovery (not to mention you might lose, or settle).

Did you have someone else repair the defect in the contractor’s work? Perhaps that person can testify to what they found and had to repair.

juliaalexis | 8 years and 9 months ago

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thanks EJR… that makes sense but i don’t have a lawyer for this. i have been to various ‘help’ sessions either through the bar or the courthouse and feel fairly confident that i won’t ‘need’ a lawyer for this process and that getting one would be prohibitively expensive. actually most of the advice from lawyers that i have gotten has been that i am better off tackling this without a lawyer and that most lawyers would probably not be interested in the case because of the low ‘reward’ for them. but who knows? very much a learning process…

EJR | 8 years and 9 months ago

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Generally the lawyer you hire would be responsible for locating and retaining the expert witness.