Delaware Business Lawyer Blog

As a Delaware business attorney, whenever I meet with a client about filing a lawsuit for breach of contract, one of the things we talk about is when did the breach of contract occur. The reason for this is to make sure it’s not too late to file the lawsuit.

Every state has a law called the “statute of limitations” which says how many years you have to file a lawsuit. In Delaware, the statute of limitations for breach of contract cases is 3 years from the date the claim “accrued.” In most cases, the date the claim accrued is the date the contract was breached.

The reason why there’s a statute of limitations is to prevent stale claims from being brought to court so that a person doesn’t have to worry for the rest of his life about being sued for something that happened a long time ago. Imagine how difficult it might be to defend a case after a long period of time has gone by where witnesses die or move away, and documents get lost.

There are exceptions, however, which allow you to file your lawsuit more than 3 years after the breach occurred. One of these exceptions is the “time of discovery” rule. If there are no facts that would place the average person on notice that there’s been a breach of contract, then the 3 year clock stops ticking until such facts that would put the person on notice of a breach are discovered or should have been discovered. It’s not easy to fall under the time of discovery rule, but you shouldn’t be discouraged from bringing a lawsuit after 3 years without first talking with a business attorney.

As a Delaware real estate attorney who’s helping many previous clients and new clients with refinancing their mortgages, I’ve begun to see an alarming trend among lenders. The loan officer notifies the customer that the mortgage has been approved, and that it’s now okay to schedule the closing. The customer calls me and we agree on a closing date. Payoffs are ordered for that date, and my client makes arrangements to take off work and have someone watch the kids.

The day before the closing, and sometimes the same day, the mortgage company calls to let us know that they’re not ready, and that the closing has to be postponed for a few days or even a few weeks. This is especially frustrating for those clients who are expecting to get cash back from their refinancing so they can pay bills. It's also a little worisome if you're facing the expiration of your rate lock.

Under these circumstances, my recommendation is to keep in touch with your loan officer on a regular basis. Email is really the best way. Each time you write, ask if there are any conditions that have not yet been met, and if there’s anything you can do to move matters along.

Once a closing date has been scheduled, again write to your loan officer letting them know the date of the closing, and reminding them how important it is to you for them to honor that date.

Why was I not surprised to read the news this morning that the $800 million venture between Delmarva Power and a company called Bluewater is now in jeopardy? You’ll recall that Bluewater was supposed to build a wind farm off the Delaware coast. Unfortunately, the company that owns Bluewater has announced that it’s breaking up and liquidating.

Who's next?

We keep hearing about billions of dollars. The billions Madoff stole. The billions in the stimulus package. But how many of us really understand the concept of how much even one billion is?

The simple answer is that one billion equals 1,000 millions. But even that doesn't really help. To put the number 1 billion in perspective, take a look at these examples:

A billion seconds ago it was 1959.

A billion minutes ago Jesus walked the earth.

A billion hours ago our ancestors were living in the stone age.

How long would it take to count to one billion? If you count one number a second without stopping until you reach a billion, that task would take you 31 years, 259 days, 1 hours, 46 minutes, and 40 seconds.