General Contractor Liability

[mlantz]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York

I hired a general contractor to do all the work associated with putting up my new modular home, including excavation, clear the land, foundation, driveway, electrical, plumbing, wood floors, drywells and draining, hvac, septic, well, etc.

In our contract, under scope of work, among all the other things, it states "Install well".

The problem I am experiencing is that my general contractor hired a subcontractor to drill the well. The subcontractor drilled a hole for 600 feet and found no water. The subcontractor asked to drill at another location on the property. The second well, also drilled to 600 feet, yielded water.

My general contractor told me that he is only responsible to pay for one well and will pay for the costs associated only with the well that yielded water, but wants me to pay for the well that did not yield water.

Since my contract with the general contractor states that he is to "install well" with no fine print regarding number of attempts, overall depth or anything of the like, is he responsible for the cost of both wells? A hole drilled in the ground without water is not a well, it is just a deep hole.
Thanks for any and all input,


Mike

 

[justalayman]

the implication of "install well" would be "provide water" which took the second drilling. If there is a arguable point in a contract, it is often decided in the favor of the person that didn't write the contract as they only had the contract in front of them to read. The writer may have had other intentions with the clause but unless described adequately, it will generally be ruled as what the common person would interpret the clause to mean. To me, install well means, discover a source of water along with the equipment to do so.

If he wanted to be limited to one hole, he should have written the contract to state as much. The inference of your contract is most likely going to be read that part of the contract was intended to include providing water to the home. If it took 12 holes to do that, then that is what it is.

he wrote "install well", not "drill A hole".


Maybe he should have hired a different well driller or maybe he should have gotten a guarantee from his driller that he didn't charge for non-productive holes.

 

[mlantz]

Thanks for your input. I am looking forward to other feedback as well.