Legal Question in Business Law in Missouri

I had a new shingle roof put on my house. Could not come up with the money to pay the total roofing bill. Called the roofing co. and asked if I could make payments each month. They agreed and I made the first payment and a week later received a payment receipt showing the deducted payment amount and a thank you.. A week later I received a note from the owner of the business stating that they do not take payments and that a lien will be put on the house and further legal action will be taken if not paid in full by a specified date. My question is, was a contract for monthly payments entered into based on the employee agreeing to take payments and that they had applied the first payment to the amount owed.


Asked on 11/22/09, 12:08 pm

2 Answers from Attorneys

Anthony Smith LawSmith

Unless your written contract says otherwise, a contract to accept monthly payments was not made under the facts you described. In order to have abinding contract, there has to be consideration. I.e. that the party to b e held to the deal (roffer) got something they otherwise were not entitled to, by making the deal. In this case, they got nothing by taking yrou partial payment thta they were nto already entitled to. Thus, unless you get something more concrete than an employee saying you can mail in your payment, you do nto have anything to bind the roofer to, that would prevent them from seeking and enforcing a mechanic's lien.

Good luck

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Answered on 11/27/09, 12:16 pm
Sean Santoro Santoro Law Office

Good question. Ordinarily, past consideration is no consideration; and any new contract requires a new consideration. However, the parties are free to amend their contract if mutually agreed upon. The key questions here are: 1) Did the original contract specify that any amendments had to be in writing, and, if so, did the new agreement actually get reduced to writing? 2) Did the employee who made this arrangement have, or appear to have, authority to do so? Feel free to email me if you want to look into this.

Sean Santoro/ Licensed in KS and MO/ [email protected]

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Answered on 11/30/09, 12:33 pm


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