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Best Practice: Align the Lease, Architect Agreement, and GC Contract Before Tenant Improvement Risk Shows Up
A lot of tenant improvement risk is set before design starts. The lease gets signed first. The architect comes in later. The general contractor comes in later still. By then, key delivery dates, landlord approval rights, notice requirements, and turnover conditions may already be fixed. If the downstream agreements do not match those upstream obligations,…
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Industry Watch – The CRUX Report Confirms What Good Contracts Have Been Telling Us All Along
One of the things I love most about construction is the process itself. When a project is working the way it should, owners, designers, contractors, and consultants are all moving in the same direction. The work is demanding, but it is also collaborative. It is disciplined. It is creative. It is deeply rewarding. When the…
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Commentary – Owner Financing Clauses in Construction Contracts Are Not Boilerplate
Most owners overlook this construction contract risk In a recent contract review, I found a redline that should concern every owner, project manager, and procurement professional. The contractor had taken the owner’s obligation to provide evidence of financial arrangements and turned any breach of that clause into a material breach. That is not a small…
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Commentary: Why “Go Slow to Go Fast in Construction” Is Procurement’s Job Now
Over coffee the other morning, I was reading a Lexology article on construction disputes. It echoed something I wrote on my own blog almost two years ago. We keep learning the same lesson: every time we skip a step, we buy trouble later. You hear the phrase “go slow to go fast in construction” more…
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Industry Watch: How This Commonly Accepted Clause Can Legally Shut Down Your Job
Most owners sign the AIA A201 General Conditions without ever discussing Section 2.2. Until it becomes a problem. A recent court decision analyzed in Lexology highlights what happens when an owner fails to provide “evidence of financial arrangements” as required under AIA A201 §2.2. In that case, the court sided with the developer after financial…
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Industry Watch: Prompt Payment Laws in Construction — Recent Cases Owners Can’t Ignore
On a Massachusetts project, an owner thought it was “just” behind on paperwork. Instead, a court found it had breached the Prompt Payment Act, deemed seven applications approved, and ordered payment of more than $4.6 million — before the owner’s own claims were even heard. That’s exactly what happened in the Tocci Building Corp. v.…
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Industry Watch: AI in Construction Disputes Is Only the Beginning
The construction industry rarely moves first with new technology. It waits.It watches.Then it adopts, carefully, and usually late. That’s why a recent announcement from the American Arbitration Association’s International Centre for Dispute Resolution (AAA-ICDR) deserves attention. Not for what it solves today, but for what it signals next. AI is no longer staying on the…
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Industry Watch: Employment Compliance Is Becoming a Procurement Risk — Not Just an HR Issue
Employment compliance has quietly moved from the back office to the jobsite. Owners are starting to feel it.Contractors are starting to worry about it.And procurement teams are increasingly being asked to manage the consequences. New employment verification requirements, combined with heightened enforcement activity, are changing how commercial construction projects should assess risk before contracts are…
