建造或改建房屋是一项复杂而昂贵的工作。 Ideally, everything goes as planned, and when the dust clears, the homeowner can settle in and enjoy the new home — and never think about the building process again.

But what happens when, nine months after the owner moves in, the floor develops a crack, the dishwasher begins to leak or the shower water won’t run hot? 或者当这些事情在三年后发生时？ It’s time to refer to an all-important piece of the contract: the warranty.

什么是保证？

The purpose of a warranty is to protect both the homeowner and the builder — homeowners from shoddy work with no recourse; 建筑商的余生都不用为项目负责。

A warranty may be included in a contract, or it may not be since it’s not required. 没有一个标准的时间长度。 相反，保修是业主和承包商之间的整体协议（合同）的一个可协商的部分。

与保证有关的法律有些模糊，各州也有所不同，因此将保证作为合同的一部分的好处是，一切都可以清楚地阐明。 然而，如果在不了解其细节的情况下同意特定的保修，业主可能会无意中限制他们在法律下本来可以得到的保护。

“A warranty describes the problems and remedies for which the builder will be responsible after completion of the project, as well as the duration of the warranty and the mechanism for addressing disputes,” says David Jaffe, vice president of legal advocacy at the National Association of Home Builders.

至少在理想情况下是这样。

适用于保证的法律

Before homeowners agree to a particular warranty as part of their contract, it’s important to understand what protections they already have under the law. In the U.S., we have a legal concept of an 默示保证 — which is a warranty that does not have to be spelled out in the contract but is simply understood to exist thanks to the law. 当涉及到房屋建设时，有两个重要的隐含保证。

The first is the 默示保证 of 良好的工艺, which is the reasonable expectation that a home will be built in a workmanlike manner. The second is the 默示保证 of 可居住性, which is the reasonable expectation that the home will be safe to inhabit.

然而，默示保证以诉讼时效法和休止法的形式受到限制，这本质上是确定房主可以起诉承包商多长时间的计时器。

诉讼时效 in each state dictate how long an owner can invoke various types of legal claims — for example, a breach of contract claim.

安息规约 具体适用于建筑项目，并规定建筑商和设计师对其产品负责的时间。 这些也因州而异。 In California, the statute of repose is four years for most defects, but 10 years for latent defects (those that aren’t observable right away, such as a faulty foundation). 在乔治亚州，所有与建筑设计或建造有关的索赔时效为八年。

Finally, most states also have a 修理权 law, which means that before homeowners can sue a contractor, they need to notify the contractor of the problem and give him or her a chance to come to see it and repair it.

To find out what the laws are in your state, simply do an online search for “statute of repose” and “修理权” in your state.

一年保修

The key thing to understand about warranties is that many builders offer their own warranty 代替 the 默示保证. Additionally, many contracts specify that homeowners are giving up their rights to the 默示保证 by agreeing to the builder’s express warranty. Also, builders will “often try to shorten statutes of limitation and statutes of repose. 有些州允许这样做。 Others don’t,” says Anthony Lehman, an Atlanta attorney who advises homeowners.

Though there is no industry-wide standard, many 住宅的承包商 have adopted a 为期一年的保修 for their contracts. The practice likely trickled down from commercial construction, where a 回调保修 is typical. 雷曼表示，回调保修悦博体育，在一年内，业主有权回调承包商，并要求他或她进行维修工作。

对于同意一年保修的房主来说，不利的一面是他们可能会放弃他们的默示保修权利，他们也可能同意限制他们发现缺陷和起诉的时间。 显然，这对建筑商来说是一个加分项，因为它限制了他们的风险。

But there is no real reason a homeowner has to accept a 为期一年的保修 simply because that’s the builder’s first offer. “It’s a negotiated point, and people can negotiate warranties that are broader — and they often do,” says Robert C. Procter, outside general counsel for the Wisconsin Builders Association. “If you don’t ask for more, you won’t get more.”

Pros and Cons of a Builder’s Warranty

虽然一年的保修期对房主来说似乎不是一笔好买卖，但一份详细说明了细节的合同确实有一个好处：在一定程度上明确了整个过程。 理想情况下，保修期不仅包括保修期，还包括评估各种材料的标准，以及出现问题时应遵循的步骤。

贾菲说，在少数几个州，立法机关已经对各种材料的质保是什么以及质保持续多长时间制定了法律。 它们是加利福尼亚州、康涅狄格州、印第安纳州、路易斯安那州、缅因州、马里兰州、明尼苏达州、密西西比州、新泽西州、纽约州、宾夕法尼亚州、德克萨斯州和弗吉尼亚州。 如果你住在其中一个州，你可以参考州设定的标准。

If you do not, one option is to refer to the NAHB’s publication 住宅建筑性能指引. “It’s broken down by categories within the home: foundations, exterior, interior, roofing, plumbing,” Jaffe says. “If there’s an issue that comes up, you look in this publication, and it tells you what the observation is — what’s the problem.” The guide then spells out what the corrective measure — if any — should be.

如果您决定使用本指南作为判断问题的标准，请确保您先阅读并熟悉其中的条款。 有时候，将条款写清楚比依赖默示保证更简单，因为默示保证是如此模糊。

“The 默示保证 doesn’t have a fixed time; it’s a reasonable period of time,” says Jaffe, of the NAHB. “If you’re a homeowner, and you call your builder up in year five and say, ‘There’s a crack here, and I think you should come out and fix it because it’s a defect,’ well, at that point, it may or may not be related to something that the builder did or didn’t do. 这是缺陷吗？ 谁来做决定呢？ 解决办法是什么？ Who is responsible for it?”

Relying on the 默示保证 means that these sorts of questions would need to be resolved in court if the parties aren’t willing to, or can’t, come to an agreement on their own. Open for debate is whether an item is a warranty item, and for how long it’s covered. 在法庭上解决这些问题对每个当事人来说都是一件既昂贵又费时的麻烦事。

尽管如此，一些律师表示，与放弃自己的权利，获得建筑商提供的有限担保相比，业主接受默示担保可能会更好。 “You build a house, and you expect it to be there for a long time. 欧洲的建筑已经存在很长时间了。 金字塔已经存在很长时间了。 The question is how long is it reasonable for you to expect it to last,” says Susan Linden McGreevy, an attorney in Kansas City, Kansas, who specializes in commercial real estate work. “If it has to get before a jury, the contractor has lost already. What I mean is, the jury will always find in favor of a homeowner — unless they’re a real flake.”

超越保修

Despite all this talk of legalities, there is an important caveat: Many 良好的建筑商 will continue to be helpful even after their express warranty has passed. 西雅图文塔纳建筑公司（Ventana Construction）的合伙人安妮·伊格拉（Anne Higuera）为她的客户提供一年的保修期。 尽管如此，即使在一年的保修期过后的几年里，Ventana仍在进行维修和修理。 Higuera says the company does so because the builders want good relationships with their customers, and because they feel as though it’s the right thing to do. “Warranty issues come up very rarely if you do things well in the first place,” Higuera says. “Just finding a contractor who does the right thing on the front end helps you avoid issues with warranty.”

更多保护自己的方法

那么，如果建筑商只提供一年的保修期，房主应该怎么做呢？ 一个选择是谈判一个更长的时间。 “You might want to say, ‘I’ll take a 为期一年的保修 for everything except latent defects,’” McGreevey says. （提醒：这些是需要很长时间才能发现的，比如地基问题。）

业主的另一个选择是向建筑商询问保险产品。 Many builders offer products with an extended warranty — as long as 10 years — that is backed by insurance companies. 这些费用通常由建筑商支付，并将成本转嫁给房主。

Third, homeowners would be wise to consult an attorney to make sure that they’re not giving up rights unknowingly. Given that owners are spending thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars on construction, paying for five to 10 hours of an attorney’s time (at $300 per hour, $1,500 to $3,000) to ensure that the contract is sound is probably a good investment. “Would you buy a car for $50,000 and not read any of the financing information?” says Lehman, the Atlanta attorney. “And then people do that for a home construction project.”

最后，最重要的是，承包商和业主都要仔细筛选对方。 “Ninety-eight percent of the homeowner-builder relationships, when there’s a disagreement, most parties reach a reasonable conclusion, even if they’re not 100 percent happy,” says Procter, the Wisconsin attorney. “The contracts matter more when someone is not being reasonable.”

作者：Erin Carlyle， Houzz.com