Episode 4: The Ugly Truth About Litigation: What Lawyers Won’t Tell You

with Jason Lambert

Episode link: https://the-quit-getting-screwed-podcast.castos.com/episodes/episode-4-the-ugly-truth-about-litigation-what-lawyers-won39t-tell-you-with-jason-lambert

INTRO: This is Karalynn Cromeens. Welcome to the Quit Getting Screwed podcast, where we talk about everything related to contractors, construction, and information to help you run better businesses. The transcript of Episode 4, “The Ugly Truth About Litigation: What Lawyers Won’t Tell You,” follows.

Karalynn: Hey guys, and welcome to the Quit Getting Screwed podcast. I’m glad you’re back to see us. And today, we have Jason Lambert, who runs his own podcast and is a construction law attorney in Florida. The name of his podcast is Hammer & Gavel, where he talks about all construction-related issues. He’s kind of a kindred spirit because he’s got lots of experience in the construction world before he became an attorney, which I think is essential to being a successful construction attorney. So, hey, welcome to the podcast, Jason! It’s so good to have you!

Jason: Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it. I’m always happy to join and happy to, you know, talk about these different things that we’re going to be talking about today. There’s not a lot of information out there for contractors. So, I think this is a great way to share it.

Karalynn: I agree. And today, we’re going to talk about the ugly truth about litigation that most other lawyers don’t want you to know. I’m sure Jason can agree with me on this; It is hard to find an attorney who genuinely has their client’s best interests at heart because, as a general rule, those things are opposed, right? The attorney wants to bill to make money, which means the more tension and litigation they can create, the more that the attorney will make, and recommending to resolve a dispute makes less money.

Jason: Yeah.

Karalynn: And so, we’re going to dive into those issues today, but before we get there, Jason, tell me a little about yourself, where you started from, and how you ended up where you are now.

Jason: Sure. I grew up in the construction industry. My parents owned an electrical supply warehouse, so I grew up working in that, working around electricians. After college, I worked for them for a little bit longer and decided I was tired of working with family. So, I went and became a project manager for one of our clients or customers, who was a big custom home builder. And so, I was a project manager for them and then a project manager for a big remodeling company down in Sarasota, which is a little further south of where I am now in Tampa. And all of this was sort of happening in that tremendous run-up in construction from like 2004 to 2007. So, it was fantastic to be in construction at that time, especially in Florida. And then, as everything started to fall off the edge of a cliff, I rode that landslide all the way back down into law school.

And part of that was because most of the work I was doing at that point in time, even as a project manager, was helping the company that I was with put together their contracts and even put together small development deals. So, it just sort of fit with what I was already doing. You know, I looked at WNAR US Home at the time, and I was like, oh, I’ll see if I can work for one of them and do some of their development work. And they all wanted you to have a law degree. So, I went to law school and then came out on the other side, still working with the same people. I’ve been representing contractors and subcontractors in Florida as an attorney now for almost another ten years. And in anything that impacts their business, whether it’s putting together contracts, representing them in litigation or other dispute resolution things, you know, labor and employment issues, immigration issues, whatever comes up, whatever impacts the industry. I try to be a resource for them. So that’s sort of the cliff notes of where I’m from and how I got to be here.

Karalynn: I think coming from the construction industry, whether it’s material supply or a subcontractor, you have a different view, right? You view your client as a whole. It’s like, okay, I’m helping them on this matter, but do they know the difference between a subcontractor and a contractor, and what are the ramifications if they don’t, you know? What are some of the big things you wish you would’ve known when you were working in the family business that you now know, or that you’ve gone back and taught them to help them run the business? I’m sure they’re your biggest client by far.

Jason: If I represented family members, they might be. But I think the biggest things that I’ve worked with them on because I have had companies that I’ve worked for in the past come back and use me. And, you know, I’d say the vast majority of that work has been helping them put together contracts that A) are just compliant. Florida’s got a handful of things that, by statute, you have to have in your contracts. I know Texas has similar requirements for at least residential construction contracts. So, you know, part of it is just that. And then the other part of it has been, B) other compliance issues. Again, Florida has a pretty funky construction lien law that’s very complicated and nuanced, and some parts of it are strict, and some parts of it are not, and it’s just helping them with that.

And so, the thing that I always say, and there’s a post on my blog about it; In Florida, the only industries that are more regulated than general contractors are doctors. And not just, you know, regular doctors, but surgeons. I mean surgeons. The guy doing surgery on your brain is the only person in the state more regulated than you as a general contractor if you just look at the volume of statutes and regulations. So, you know, you have to act as if you’re in a heavily regulated industry, even if you don’t realize it. Even if it’s just you, you know, doing handshake deals with people, all the statutes and everything still applies. So that’s been the biggest thing that I’ve been able to work with people on, and that I’ve needed to work with people on, honestly.

Karalynn: Yeah, and they don’t know all that going into the business, right. They have no idea that all these things are required, and neither did you when you were working there. And now that you know all this stuff, it’s important to share. So, do you have to be licensed to be a contractor in Florida? Because in some states like Texas, you don’t have to be licensed. You can come do whatever you need to do. What does Florida have?

Jason: There’s a very extensive licensing scheme. There’s a whole statute, Chapter 49, that governs almost any type of contractor. Electrical contractors have their own separate special statute, but they’re both governed by the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation. Florida just reduced some requirements for people, contractors, who’ve been licensed out of state for at least ten years. It’s easier now to get a license in Florida than it used to be. And we’ve been helping a ton of people with that because it’s a booming industry down here. We need more skilled workers coming down here. And so, you’re seeing people take advantage of it. But even for somebody who’s been a contractor for ten years or more, there’s a lot of hoops to jump through. And the penalties in Florida for not being properly licensed are, your contract is unenforceable. So, if you sign a quarter of a million-dollar contract for something and you get paid for it, and something goes wrong at the end, they can demand all that money back. Plus, it’s a crime. So now you’re facing criminal charges, too.

Karalynn: Damn. Yeah, wow. That’s pretty stringent. But then again, I can understand why. We have very few rules about that. Most of it happens after the work is already done, like in Texas. And I deal with a lot of homeowners that have contractors come, get paid some of it, and then walk the rest. And, I mean, these guys don’t have anything to chase, and they come to me. What can I do? I mean, you can sue them, but I don’t know if it will be collectible. So, you probably just want to take your money and finish your project because I don’t have any teeth like that. So, I can understand why this is required.

Jason: Right.

Karalynn: So, what has been your experience in litigation? Do you actually go into the courtroom or arbitration to have a dispute decided? I’m just curious what your general overall perception is and what it was like for your client.

Jason: I have a lot of experience in it. Overall, I think it’s a terrible way to ultimately resolve disputes, for one of the reasons you mentioned at the beginning of the podcast. In some cases, you have an attorney on the other side, really driving the bus for their client and trying to run up fees or, maybe they’ve taken an absurd position with their client that they can’t go back on, so they have to continue litigating. Otherwise, they might have to admit they made a mistake or that they weren’t right about something. So, I find it to be generally horrible in that regard. And for a lot of my clients, some of them come angry, they want to fight, and they don’t care how much it costs. They want to win on principle.

And that’s fine, but principals are very expensive to have in litigation. So, you know, if they want to do that, that’s fine. But most of them, honestly, by the time you’ve been in a lawsuit for three or four months, and they start to realize how dragged out the process is going to be, even if you’re doing everything quickly; it takes time to get hearings. It takes time for the other side to respond to things. Or the other side was, you know, claims that the work was done incorrectly. And I’ve never met a client who felt they did anything, you know, that wasn’t the most flawless work ever. So, you know, and they just can’t understand. How are they bringing this up? How can they even possibly say this?

It’s all of that. I mean, the other side can say and do whatever they want to do. And ultimately, it comes down to who’s the judge going to believe, or who’s the jury going to believe? And I think that’s a hard concept for a lot of people in the industry to understand because they’re used to dealing with a very concrete thing. We built a building, and it’s either there or it’s not. It’s standing, or it’s not. It’s passed its inspection, or it hasn’t. It’s painted, or it’s not. There’s none of this, “Well, there’s all these gray areas in litigation, and here’s what I think they’re trying to do.” And, you know, I just think that’s a different world for many of them to deal with on a regular basis.

Karalynn: And here’s the other thing in my experience, and I don’t know if it’s the same there. How much construction law do your judges understand, and where do you start with them? And then, on top of that, how often can you predict how they’re going to rule and what’s going to happen?

Jason: Oh, absolutely. No, that’s a huge issue. There’s one or two that I know from how they practice that they at least had some construction experience. But yeah, finding a judge who understands it, especially when in Florida, you have a lien law that there are tons of case laws that says it’s to be strictly construed. So, if you didn’t dot all your Is and cross your Ts, you quite literally can lose whatever money you had into the project. And some judges are fine with that and understand it, and others do not. It makes it very hard to predict what a court is going to do because even if the law says that this is what the result should be, you can come out of a hearing with all sorts of splitting of the baby and everything else. I think some judges are, you know, some of them are trying to be fair as opposed to applying the law, which you know, is what it is. That’s a topic for a whole other podcast.

And then I also think that there are some judges who, you know, they’re looking for an easier way to make a decision. So, if they can decide on some procedural ground or something else that maybe it disposed of the case, maybe it keeps it going, but it doesn’t really get to the core of the issue there, which also can be frustrating for a client. It’s like, oh, we’ve done all this work to get to this point only to be pushed down another road by the court system or something else. And, again, that doesn’t jive with getting things done and getting disputes resolved.

Karalynn: So, a client comes to you and says, what’s going to happen and how much is it going to cost? I mean, as an attorney, how do you answer that question? I want to know how you answer it because I just stand and say, I don’t know, I don’t know, just give me your credit card. And I hate saying that, but I don’t know any of this. I mean, how do you handle it?

Jason: I tell most people if it’s sort of a typical, and I say “typical” in air quotes, two-party contractor versus a property owner or a contractor versus a contractor, just two people, not a “general contractor names 35 subcontractors and a huge construction defect” case. But I tell them, listen, these things can last 18 months to two years, to even longer depending on the court system. And you need to plan to spend at least $2,000 to $3,000 a month on average. So, if you’re prepared to buy three or four brand new trucks and pay for them for the next three years, that’s what I cost you. Then you should pick this fight. And if you’re not, then we should find other ways to resolve it. That really brings it home for a lot of people because everybody thinks, oh, I can pay the $5,000 retainer or the $3,000 retainer or whatever it is. Or, you know, some months it will be expensive, but most months maybe they’ll only be a few hundred bucks. And what they don’t realize is, you know, if you do a bunch of depositions in one month, that might be a $10,000 a month for billing. And you have the first two months before that were only a few hundred bucks, but that’s why two to $3,000 per month is what it averages out to. So that’s, that’s how I answer it because I think it hits home a lot easier for most people. They can wrap their mind around like, okay, do I have a business that can cashflow that? And if so, then maybe they’re willing to do it. If not, then, a lot of times, we find other ways to resolve things.

Karalynn: I agree, especially when you have no predictability because you cannot tell. And then the other question is, how many clients have ever really been made whole by the litigation process in your experience?

Jason: None. Even if you get every dime you’re owed by the customer, you’ve still paid me too. And at best, you’re going to get about 90% of my fees from a judge. And all of this is assuming the person on the other side can stroke you a check for it.

Karalynn: Exactly. And that at the end of the day, it’s all collectible. And it’s just ridiculous to me that we go, let’s rush to the courthouse, let’s rush to trial because at the end of the day, honestly, the only people that get paid are the lawyers, right? We get paid to do that, but we’re doing you a disservice if we don’t show you all the ways to settle the dispute before you get there. Because not only are you paying me: consider how much time you have to spend away from your business producing every single document you can ever imagine that ever even related to this case. It may not even be used, but you have to produce it. And your deposition is taken, and you’ve got to be there to take other people’s depositions. So, I always tell my clients that, before you walk into that, really think about it because your time is honestly better spent putting it into your business because you’ll get something out of it there. Here, all I can say is, yeah, you probably are not going to break even, and it’s going to take a lot of your time. And don’t get me wrong; If you get sued, you don’t have a choice. But if you’re the one who’s going to bring it, you should think about it. So, what, in your experience, are some ways to get around that? What are some other ideas besides litigation?

Jason: I mean, I always try to ask clients if there’s a way that we can informally resolve it, you know, can we talk to the other side? Do you want to see if everybody’s willing to split the cost of the mediation? For most of the construction contracts I draft for my clients, I put a pre-suit mediation requirement in there because, even if you don’t resolve it, it forces the other side to show some of their cards early on. And often, that’s the first time my clients have ever had to truly hear what the other side thinks is an issue. And it can drastically change how quickly or ready they are to jump into litigation. If they see like, oh wow, this could genuinely be a fight. There could be some issues here. So, I’ve tried to do that. I’ve honestly had a decent success rate. I’d say maybe a third or so of the cases have settled at mediation. Usually, some sort of a walk away because everybody realizes, wow, this is going to be expensive and time-consuming for all of us. We should move along.

So that’s the biggest thing that I’ve found to be successful. And if you put it in a contract and the parties have to do it. Or, if somebody sues you, you can get a court to compel mediation and stay the litigation. So again, you have that opportunity to do that before everybody has spent, you know, a billion dollars on things. That’s really been the most effective thing that I’ve seen lately. The other thing that I have found to be super effective, and this may not make total sense, but I’ve started including non-disparagement clauses in my contracts for contractors as well.

And yes, that makes sense so that people don’t give bad reviews. But when people don’t do that or put something up there, and you show them the non-disparagement provision, they take it down. That is what honestly has incited so much litigation because my client frankly doesn’t care that they got stiffed five grand. They care, but they’re not willing to go to war over that. But if you post a bad review and they were worried that it could cost them business, they are willing to go to war over that.

Jason: And so, having a non-disparagement provision has actually saved some of that because it makes people take down stuff that they shouldn’t have written. That’s not obvious, but it has worked.

Karalynn: That’s a great idea!

Jason: Yeah.

Karalynn: I have those in my settlement agreements, but I haven’t thought about putting them in that actual contract agreements. But, especially on the residential side, if somebody is willing to sign it, most definitely. Do you ever threaten litigation to resolve a matter, even though you’re not going to, or your client doesn’t want to?

Jason: I mean, I’ve definitely put in demand letters or things like that, that we’re going to sue or we’re prepared to sue. I’ve drafted complaints to include with letters that we were never going to file. Honestly, I don’t know that that’s ever made a case settle before litigation.

Karalynn: If the other side has been in litigation before, I think they’ll think twice, you know?

Jason: I don’t know. I try not to put things in letters that I’m not actually going to do because inevitably, you have a client who wants to do that, and then they want to threaten something else that they’re never going to do. And eventually, it’s like, listen; they’re just throwing our letters in the fire because we’re never going to follow up on any of this stuff.

Karalynn: Yeah, because there are no teeth behind them if you don’t pick your fight and actually do it.

Jason: Right. So, I don’t threaten litigation a whole lot unless it’s genuinely going to happen. And this is another reason; Florida has some pretty onerous consumer protection laws that prohibit you from making certain types of threats. And so that’s another reason I’ve steered away from some of it is unless you’re really going to do it. You know, a savvy consumer protection lawyer could try to use that against you, and all of a sudden, you’ve taken a case where you thought you should win $10,000 into something that the other side’s entitled to a thousand-dollar statutory award plus attorney’s fees. And that may just be peculiar to Florida. But that’s another reason I try not to threaten stuff unless we’re actually going to do it.

Karalynn: I guess here’s the question. How backed up are your courts from COVID in Florida?

Jason: In terms of getting an actual trial, you can’t get in on the civil side right now. They’re so backed up. They’re still there doing hearings. We’re doing Zoom hearings, things like that. I’m interested to hear how Texas is handling it as well. So, you’re getting some of that stuff. But even that is at least a month or two out, and again, you just can’t get trial dates right now. So, what are you guys experiencing?

Karalynn: Before COVID, we were about a year from when you file a suit that you’d get your first trial setting. Now, don’t get me wrong, you’d probably get passed once or twice before you actually go. But now we’re two years. You get your docket control order stating two years out. Additionally, we are handling hearings via Zoom, and we’re doing bench trials. I’ve had a couple of bench trials via Zoom that went pretty well. The jury trials are the ones that are seriously suffering. They tried to use the big convention center to do it. And I think, with the governor lifting the order, effective tomorrow, they’re going to bring back jury trials. I think they might require a mask, but I don’t know. Those are back in the works, though. I just have so many cases that should have gone early this spring. I have like six cases that are ready to go to trial, and I can just sit. You know, there’s nothing I can do. There’s nothing else to do. And it’s really hard to sell that to a client, which is why I’ve been pushing, lately, arbitration. I know it’s way more expensive, but six to nine months is just better. How do you feel about arbitration?

Jason: I like it for that reason; That you can get things done a lot faster, especially right now. And it is more expensive, but you also get to keep everything private. So, if you’re concerned about bad stuff being said about your company, arbitration is a good way to keep all of that out of the public record. Yeah. So, I have been doing that a lot more. The only thing that I don’t like about arbitration is, you know, a judge is used to sending somebody home disappointed at the end of every hearing. And I feel like arbitrators are less used to that, so you’re much more likely to get an arbitrator who splits the baby or does something else like that at the end of the day rather than maybe giving you everything you could have gotten in a court system. But that’s the trade-off, you know? You either go for slow and a little less expensive and get what you want or, you know, get half of it, but you can be done in nine months.

Karalynn: The other thing I like about arbitration, too, is there are no discovery disputes. Everything comes in. Produce me everything; I’ll give you everything. It’s all open. The arbitrator will decide because, I mean, so much of the funds in litigation are spent on that process. You know, sending the request, responding to the request, people objecting. Just give me the stuff! And so, I’m trying to start this wave in the discovery and litigation that, hey, we’re just going to give you everything I have because you know, this back and forth, I’m not going to produce it because I don’t think I have to. It just costs everybody money and time. So, yeah.

Jason: No, I totally agree with that. I’ve started doing the same thing. I remember my first job out of law school, you know, being taught how to respond to discovery requests, and it was all these objections and all this sort of stuff. And I’ll object if something’s really sort of outside, you know? Hey, you’re not entitled to all of our bank statements; that’s financial discovery. But you’re entitled to all this other stuff so let’s just give it to you. Because honestly, here’s the thing: I think that’s a function of once you’ve started actually to go to trial and deal with evidence and evidentiary objections and how that matters, you start to care a whole lot less about what gets discovered, because fine, you can discover all this stuff. You’re never getting it in a trial.

Karalynn: We’ll have the dispute in the courthouse when we go to trial, if it’s going to happen at all, I agree. But this whole build-up about what I should produce, what I should not produce; Let’s just be real, and I’ll give you everything I got. If you’re going to overreach them, we’re going to fight. But, okay. So that brings up, how do you feel about, and have you seen, subscription pricing? Every month, no matter what you do, the client gets the same bill—every month.

Jason: I have seen that. I think you just started offering it. I think I saw that. And there’s another firm over here that started by me, now they have a bunch of offices around the country, but they do a lot of subscription stuff as well. I think especially related to liens. I don’t know that it covers any litigation or anything like that. You know, I’ve talked to some of my clients about it, like, Hey, would you rather just pay X amount of dollars to me every month and not have to worry, be able to ask me things and whatever? Most of them have said like, no, I’d rather just pay you when I need you. And so, even if it averages out over the same price per month, that’s fine. I’d rather just do it that way.

I almost wonder if it’s a generational thing. I’m very much not that I’m super young, but I’m very much of the mindset like, I’d be willing to pay ten bucks a month for that, to know that that’s what the price was going to be or a hundred bucks or 500 or whatever it is. I’m way more open to that. Most of my clients are probably about 15-or-so years older than me, at least my main client contacts. And most of them said, no, I’ll just pay you as I use it. But I do wonder if it’s going to become more popular with a generation or two from now that’s used to it. Those that think, oh, everything I bought on my phone, everything I’ve bought here and there, it’s all sort of a subscription. I wonder if it’s going to become way more commonplace that they’re going to say, hey, let me have this access to this set level of services for a certain dollar amount every month. And then the question mark always for me is how do you handle litigation? I mean, do you handle litigation as part of your subscription?

Karalynn: I do. I have a subscription plan that handles basically all plaintiff work, right? Plaintiff work for a flat fee. If you’re countersued, that’s an hourly rate that I discount 20%. So, all of my lien clients that come in, I have a subscription plan to handle all of their liens, bond claims, whatever. Then if they want to take the next level and go to litigation, they can, because the biggest thing is like, “oh my God,” how much is it going to cost? And if you have one lawsuit, the subscription plan is not for you. But suppose you’re a material supplier or somebody that has several lawsuits. In that case, it’s going to be a fit for you, and it’s going to be predictable and something you can work into your collection costs. And really what it comes down to at the end of the day because we can get our fees here as I collect it back, but if you do it consistently and you do it right, you’ll have less than a 1% write-off on the business that you do if you do everything properly.

So, I think that’s where the wave of the future is. Plus, I just think it’s so much more sellable, right? Especially if somebody wants to go to litigation and they’ve already been burned or my competitors that billed them once a month and it’s $12,000 or $13,000 a month, I offer way better service, and I offer predictable pricing. I surveyed all my clients, and one of the biggest things is the price, right. Especially when you start litigation, it’s really hot and heavy, like $6,000 or $7,000. And then people are burnt out. They’re like, oh my God, what is this going to end? And it’s only just started. And I got sick having to kick clients that I cared about to the curb because I couldn’t afford to represent them because they couldn’t afford to pay me. And that happens all the time, where if they had had this option, we could have worked together.

Jason: I want to pick your brain for a second. So again, a lot of my clients, the way I’ve sort of characterized them is they have a problem every three years. And so, every three or four years, we’re involved in a lawsuit and then nothing, you know. Do you find that most of your clients fit that bill, or are most of them more like material suppliers or people who have, you know, four or five or six active disputes? I’m curious.

Karalynn: I kind of run the gamut. So, I offer subscription pricing, but I also offer what I call is my general retainer. Having built my firm from the ground up, I’ve run it differently. Okay? And it runs the way it is, so it’s good for the client and what I need to survive. So, I have a $2,500 retainer that I put in an IOLTA account that just stays there, and basically, you can call me about any matter. Should I sign this release? Can you review the subcontract? And I have a bunch of different pricing for that. So, whatever they have in the in-between. The alternative is I want to be there to help you. So, you call me, and I do this for you, and I don’t charge you because that’s just the way it is. And then, after a while, you start to feel guilty for doing that.

But this way, if you have that little question, I can answer it. I can review the document, get it back to you. And then every two weeks, I send out a bill, and I have a credit card on file to charge that. If your credit card doesn’t go through, I’ll take it from the retainer. But if there’s no work, you don’t get a bill. If there’s work, you get a bill for the work that’s done. And so, I find that helpful. Because, having been in the business, what we needed as a material supplier was, should I sign this release? And I need that answer now because I need to make payroll, and I need that check. So, the kind of service that the mom-and-pop shop needs is having me available all the time.

And so, for those kinds of clients, that’s what I offer. And so, if they get a letter in the mail, I’ll respond or, you know, that kind of thing, it’s just whatever it costs. For material supplier clients, the subscription would make more sense because it handles all their liens, all of their bond claims collection, phone calls, and then if they have to go to litigation, it handles the pro side. And the great thing about a material supplier, if you’re suing an owner on a lien, it’s very unlikely for you to have a counterclaim unless there’s something wrong with the materials. So, you know, that’s the sweet spot where you want to be is that I supply the stuff. You know, I’m reading all 50 states, and Texas is one of those states that, and this is where the court screws me up, but if you can prove that you supplied it to the subcontractor, that’s it. You don’t have to prove actual incorporations. Some other states require incorporation. And don’t get me wrong, not every judge will follow that. I’ve gotten my ass kicked because, as a material supplier, I only had signed delivery tickets and I didn’t have pictures of the shit used on the job site. But anyway, I digress. So that’s kind of what I offer because I want to offer the service that I would have needed as a business owner, as I material supplier.

Jason: No, I think that makes a lot of sense. And it’s funny you talk about drawing from your own experience. Because of my experience on the construction site, being more of a GC or even a subcontractor, I understand the appeal of a subscription plan, but I also think, well, gee, we never would have used it. We called our attorney, you know, once or twice a year. So there would have been ten months out of the year that we were paying for something we didn’t use. It would’ve made more sense to have a retainer call when we need and replenish as we need. But I completely get it for material suppliers, and I even understand it for higher volume subcontractors. I think if you’ve got more of a service-oriented business that the lien laws would apply to, I think it probably makes a ton of sense. So, I like the idea.

Karalynn: I just think there’s so much. Here’s a great example; I had a client come in the other day, and he’s always like, he knows he needs a lawyer, and he’s grumpy about it. He hates that we charge, and he’s like, “Lawyer and Dentist. You’re in the same place!” And I said, “You know, what? If you got your teeth cleaned more often, you wouldn’t get fillings. And that’s kind of like how I feel! If you’d come in and listen to me when I send out that email, saying, hey, you need to get an employee handbook, and I have a flat fee on it. Come do it. Otherwise, you’re going to have to get a filling a later on.

Jason: Right. Exactly. No, that’s a great analogy. I totally agree. Get your contract up to speed. Get your handbooks in order. Get everything else because when you need it, you will wish you’d had it for as long as you could have had it.

Karalynn: I agree. I agree. Well, thank you. I think this has been a great topic, a great discussion. And if anybody needs a construction lawyer in Florida, call Jason Lambert. Hammerandgavel.com is where you’ll find his podcast, and we’ll make sure to put all that in the show notes. But this has been a very interesting conversation, and I think in the future, we’ll be picking your brain on Florida lien laws. I’m trying to learn every state, and you happen to be an expert there. So, I will have you on the show for that, but is there anything else you’d like to add, Mr. Jason?

Jason: No, this was so much fun. I’m excited for you to be launching this podcast as well, so this was a great time. And please, anything you need, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I look forward to talking to you again soon!

Karalynn: We’ve had some great advice here on how to quit getting screwed as it comes to litigation and attorney’s fees. Thank you, Jason.

Jason: Thank you.

OUTRO: Thank you for listening to this episode of the Quit Getting Screwed podcast. I hope you found it helpful, and if you like what you hear, please like us and follow our podcast. Do you want further information? If so, you can find us at subcontractorinstitute.com. We’re also on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, and the book is available on Amazon. Tune in two weeks now for a new episode. Thank you.

Connect with Jason Lambert:

Website https://www.dinsmore.com/jason-s-lambert/florida-liens-resource/

LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonlambertesq/

Blog & Podcast https://hammerngavel.com/about