Legal Questions and Answers

Good morning. This will depend on whether your contract is a fixed price, time and materials, or some other orangemen, and what your contract says about materials to be used, the contractor's ability to provide substitute materials, and any contractual limitations on the price increase for substitute materials. You may want to request a layer review your contract for these provisions and advise accordingly.

I just read your request. I would need more information in order to give you some advice. If you want a free consultation let me know and we'll set up a time

This situation should be reviewed before you agree to pay the $350,000. The first documents I would examine are your commercial lease, any landlord representations regarding code compliance or permitted use of the premises as a restaurant, the certificate of occupancy and permit history, and the notices or reports identifying the gas-line violations. Tennessee currently applies the International Fuel Gas Code to regulated construction, but the governmental authority responsible for permitting and inspection can depend on where the property is located. Whether the cost ultimately falls on you or the property owner will depend heavily on the lease. Commercial leases frequently allocate responsibility for code compliance, repairs, pre-existing conditions, tenant improvements, and governmental requirements differently. If the gas work predated your tenancy and the premises were represented as suitable for restaurant use, there may be substantial issues concerning the landlord's obligations, representations, and potentially your remedies under the lease. I would not assume that simply because the municipality is requiring corrective work before opening, you are contractually responsible for the entire cost. The pizza oven is a separate ownership issue. The fact that the prior restaurant operator filed bankruptcy does not automatically mean the oven belongs to its creditors. You would need to determine whether the oven was owned by the former tenant, leased, subject to a perfected security interest, abandoned or transferred through the bankruptcy, or legally became a fixture of the real property. Tennessee law recognizes separate creditor and priority rules for goods and fixtures, including circumstances in which a secured creditor may have rights to remove fixtures. Before removing, using, or disposing of the oven, I would review the prior tenant's bankruptcy docket and asset schedules, run a UCC lien search, and determine whether the landlord received title to or abandoned-property rights in the equipment. I would also obtain the complete permitting history for the building and have counsel review the lease before accepting responsibility for a remediation bill of this magnitude.

You likely have more leverage than the termination clause alone. A publisher that took payment for services it never delivered, ignored a promotion commitment, and now refuses to respond has its own performance problems under the agreement, and those may matter more than the three-year sales trigger. The specifics of your contract control, including its termination, notice, refund, and governing law provisions, and the Tennessee and Oklahoma pieces need to be handled in the right order. I'm licensed in Tennessee and my firm has an Oklahoma-licensed attorney who has published multiple books, so we can review the agreement and lay out your options for a flat fee. Feel free to request a proposal.

Yes. Schedule B is part of Form 1120-S, and the IRS instructions state that an S corporation should complete all Schedule B items that apply to the corporation. Schedule B contains informational questions regarding matters such as ownership, accounting method, business activity, shareholder information, foreign transactions, and certain elections or reporting obligations. That does not necessarily mean every question will require a substantive entry. Some questions may simply be answered “Yes,” “No,” or left inapplicable depending on the corporation’s circumstances. If you are preparing the return yourself and are uncertain whether a particular Schedule B question applies, it is worth having a CPA or tax professional review the return before filing.

There may be. A lot will depend on what your lease actually says and what you have in writing from the owner about the 30-day “easy out.” If the owner clearly agreed that you could terminate with 30 days’ notice, your 45-day notice and the communications surrounding it could be important. That said, an oral agreement may not be enforceable if it conflicts with the written lease, particularly if the lease requires changes, notice, or waivers to be in writing. You should have a Tennessee attorney review the lease, your termination notice, and all communications with the owner to determine if the alleged damages are correct and legitimate. There may be defenses available depending on the lease language.

This is the United States of America. You can sue anyone.

The short answer is: your Alabama documents are most likely still legally valid in Georgia, but a Georgia attorney review is strongly recommended — especially given your situation living alone and widowed. Here is the breakdown: Will Georgia recognizes a will validly executed in another state as long as it was properly signed and witnessed under that state's law at the time it was made. Alabama and Georgia both require two witnesses, so your will should be fine. That said, if your Alabama will names your spouse or references Alabama-specific assets, accounts, or property that has since changed, it absolutely needs updating for that reason alone. Power of Attorney Georgia adopted the Uniform Power of Attorney Act in 2017. Georgia will generally honor a POA validly created in another state. However, Georgia has specific statutory language that banks, hospitals, and other institutions are accustomed to seeing. If your Alabama POA does not track Georgia's statutory form, some institutions may resist honoring it or ask for additional paperwork, which can cause serious delays in a crisis. Having a Georgia-compliant POA dramatically reduces that friction. Healthcare Directive / Advance Directive This is the most important one to update. Georgia has its own Advance Directive for Health Care form that combines a living will and healthcare proxy. Georgia medical providers are trained on this specific form. An Alabama healthcare directive may be legally valid here, but you may encounter real-world resistance from hospitals and doctors who are not familiar with it. A Georgia-specific advance directive is highly advisable. Practical Concerns Given Your Situation Living alone and widowed means your agent under your POA and your healthcare proxy are your first and only lines of protection if something happens. You want zero friction when those documents need to be used. This is not the situation to test whether an out-of-state document will be accepted in a moment of urgency. You should also confirm that whoever you have named as your agent, executor, and healthcare proxy is still the right person, still willing, and still able to serve. Bottom Line Your documents are not void, but getting them reviewed and updated for Georgia is genuinely worth the time and cost. At a minimum, a new Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care and a Georgia-compliant Durable POA should be strongly considered. While you are at it, confirm your beneficiary designations on any life insurance, IRAs, and bank accounts, as those pass outside your will regardless. Next Step The easiest way to get this handled is to open a project on ContractsCounsel at www.contractscounsel.com. You can post your document review and drafting project there, receive competitive flat-fee bids from Georgia-licensed attorneys who handle exactly this type of elder law work, and get everything updated without having to search for a lawyer on your own. It is a straightforward process and puts you in control of the cost upfront. Given your situation, this is one of those things that is well worth getting done sooner rather than later.

The short answer is: your Alabama documents are most likely still legally valid in Georgia, but a Georgia attorney review is strongly recommended — especially given your situation living alone and widowed. Here is the breakdown: Will Georgia recognizes a will validly executed in another state as long as it was properly signed and witnessed under that state's law at the time it was made. Alabama and Georgia both require two witnesses, so your will should be fine. That said, if your Alabama will names your spouse or references Alabama-specific assets, accounts, or property that has since changed, it absolutely needs updating for that reason alone. Power of Attorney Georgia adopted the Uniform Power of Attorney Act in 2017. Georgia will generally honor a POA validly created in another state. However, Georgia has specific statutory language that banks, hospitals, and other institutions are accustomed to seeing. If your Alabama POA does not track Georgia's statutory form, some institutions may resist honoring it or ask for additional paperwork, which can cause serious delays in a crisis. Having a Georgia-compliant POA dramatically reduces that friction. Healthcare Directive / Advance Directive This is the most important one to update. Georgia has its own Advance Directive for Health Care form that combines a living will and healthcare proxy. Georgia medical providers are trained on this specific form. An Alabama healthcare directive may be legally valid here, but you may encounter real-world resistance from hospitals and doctors who are not familiar with it. A Georgia-specific advance directive is highly advisable. Practical Concerns Given Your Situation Living alone and widowed means your agent under your POA and your healthcare proxy are your first and only lines of protection if something happens. You want zero friction when those documents need to be used. This is not the situation to test whether an out-of-state document will be accepted in a moment of urgency. You should also confirm that whoever you have named as your agent, executor, and healthcare proxy is still the right person, still willing, and still able to serve. Bottom Line Your documents are not void, but getting them reviewed and updated for Georgia is genuinely worth the time and cost. At a minimum, a new Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care and a Georgia-compliant Durable POA should be strongly considered. While you are at it, confirm your beneficiary designations on any life insurance, IRAs, and bank accounts, as those pass outside your will regardless. Next Step The easiest way to get this handled is to open a project on ContractsCounsel at www.contractscounsel.com. You can post your document review and drafting project there, receive competitive flat-fee bids from Georgia-licensed attorneys who handle exactly this type of elder law work, and get everything updated without having to search for a lawyer on your own. It is a straightforward process and puts you in control of the cost upfront. Given your situation, this is one of those things that is well worth getting done sooner rather than later.

The short answer is: your Alabama documents are most likely still legally valid in Georgia, but a Georgia attorney review is strongly recommended — especially given your situation living alone and widowed. Here is the breakdown: Will Georgia recognizes a will validly executed in another state as long as it was properly signed and witnessed under that state's law at the time it was made. Alabama and Georgia both require two witnesses, so your will should be fine. That said, if your Alabama will names your spouse or references Alabama-specific assets, accounts, or property that has since changed, it absolutely needs updating for that reason alone. Power of Attorney Georgia adopted the Uniform Power of Attorney Act in 2017. Georgia will generally honor a POA validly created in another state. However, Georgia has specific statutory language that banks, hospitals, and other institutions are accustomed to seeing. If your Alabama POA does not track Georgia's statutory form, some institutions may resist honoring it or ask for additional paperwork, which can cause serious delays in a crisis. Having a Georgia-compliant POA dramatically reduces that friction. Healthcare Directive / Advance Directive This is the most important one to update. Georgia has its own Advance Directive for Health Care form that combines a living will and healthcare proxy. Georgia medical providers are trained on this specific form. An Alabama healthcare directive may be legally valid here, but you may encounter real-world resistance from hospitals and doctors who are not familiar with it. A Georgia-specific advance directive is highly advisable. Practical Concerns Given Your Situation Living alone and widowed means your agent under your POA and your healthcare proxy are your first and only lines of protection if something happens. You want zero friction when those documents need to be used. This is not the situation to test whether an out-of-state document will be accepted in a moment of urgency. You should also confirm that whoever you have named as your agent, executor, and healthcare proxy is still the right person, still willing, and still able to serve. Bottom Line Your documents are not void, but getting them reviewed and updated for Georgia is genuinely worth the time and cost. At a minimum, a new Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care and a Georgia-compliant Durable POA should be strongly considered. While you are at it, confirm your beneficiary designations on any life insurance, IRAs, and bank accounts, as those pass outside your will regardless. Next Step The easiest way to get this handled is to open a project on ContractsCounsel at www.contractscounsel.com. You can post your document review and drafting project there, receive competitive flat-fee bids from Georgia-licensed attorneys who handle exactly this type of elder law work, and get everything updated without having to search for a lawyer on your own. It is a straightforward process and puts you in control of the cost upfront. Given your situation, this is one of those things that is well worth getting done sooner rather than later.

The short answer is: your Alabama documents are most likely still legally valid in Georgia, but a Georgia attorney review is strongly recommended — especially given your situation living alone and widowed. Here is the breakdown: Will Georgia recognizes a will validly executed in another state as long as it was properly signed and witnessed under that state's law at the time it was made. Alabama and Georgia both require two witnesses, so your will should be fine. That said, if your Alabama will names your spouse or references Alabama-specific assets, accounts, or property that has since changed, it absolutely needs updating for that reason alone. Power of Attorney Georgia adopted the Uniform Power of Attorney Act in 2017. Georgia will generally honor a POA validly created in another state. However, Georgia has specific statutory language that banks, hospitals, and other institutions are accustomed to seeing. If your Alabama POA does not track Georgia's statutory form, some institutions may resist honoring it or ask for additional paperwork, which can cause serious delays in a crisis. Having a Georgia-compliant POA dramatically reduces that friction. Healthcare Directive / Advance Directive This is the most important one to update. Georgia has its own Advance Directive for Health Care form that combines a living will and healthcare proxy. Georgia medical providers are trained on this specific form. An Alabama healthcare directive may be legally valid here, but you may encounter real-world resistance from hospitals and doctors who are not familiar with it. A Georgia-specific advance directive is highly advisable. Practical Concerns Given Your Situation Living alone and widowed means your agent under your POA and your healthcare proxy are your first and only lines of protection if something happens. You want zero friction when those documents need to be used. This is not the situation to test whether an out-of-state document will be accepted in a moment of urgency. You should also confirm that whoever you have named as your agent, executor, and healthcare proxy is still the right person, still willing, and still able to serve. Bottom Line Your documents are not void, but getting them reviewed and updated for Georgia is genuinely worth the time and cost. At a minimum, a new Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care and a Georgia-compliant Durable POA should be strongly considered. While you are at it, confirm your beneficiary designations on any life insurance, IRAs, and bank accounts, as those pass outside your will regardless. Next Step The easiest way to get this handled is to open a project on ContractsCounsel at www.contractscounsel.com. You can post your document review and drafting project there, receive competitive flat-fee bids from Georgia-licensed attorneys who handle exactly this type of elder law work, and get everything updated without having to search for a lawyer on your own. It is a straightforward process and puts you in control of the cost upfront. Given your situation, this is one of those things that is well worth getting done sooner rather than later.

You can sue anyone for any reason. Your real question is, "will I be successful?" That question cannot be answered without looking at the evidence supporting your allegations and the relationship with your aunt. If you are a disabled adult, as defined by your state's law, and your aunt was your guardian or conservator, then it is possible that a rebuttable presumption would arise. That means, it would be assumed that your aunt breached her fiduciary duties to you and it is presumed that fraud and undue influence came into play. The burden would be on her to rebut the presumption. Your case would become much stronger.

Pennsylvania ethics rules permit a lawyer to serve as executor for a client, subject to PA RPC 1.7 conflict disclosure and PA RPC 1.8 Comment guidance, including advising of the lawyer's financial interest and the availability of alternative candidates. An engagement would be a long-tail fiduciary commitment, and the executor role should sit in a separate engagement letter with full Rule 1.7 disclosures, written informed consent, succession provisions, and confirmed fiduciary insurance. The engagement is ethically allowed, but there are enough structural hurdles with having a lawyer serve as executor that one may want to consider a bank or institutional executor in some cases.

I am very sorry that you are having to deal with a situation like this during such a difficult time in your life. You are most likely looking for a probate attorney. Probate attorneys handle the distribution of an estate after a person dies. They work with the court, debtors, heirs, etc. to distribute the estate per state law and any estate planning documents the person had.

Most used car sales in Tennessee are "as-is," and if your buyer's guide and contract say that, the dealer generally isn't on the hook for repairs as a contractual matter. The first thing to check: does your paperwork show "As-Is - No Warranty" or "Implied Warranties Only" or "Dealer Warranty"? If the dealer misrepresented the truck's condition, knew about pre-existing defects and concealed them, or has been stringing you along in bad faith, the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act allows for treble (triple) damages and attorney's fees. This is often the strongest hammer in used-car disputes

After the sale, did you continue living there and paying the lease amount? It's difficult to expand on my answer without reading the agreement (it cannot be oral). Assuming the agreement is what you say, you might consider recording a Lis Pendens on the property. That will get everyone's attention, I can assure you. Probably also consider a quiet title action. None of that advice is necessarily relevant; it depends on what the agreement says.

The short answer is that they probably can. Colorado is an at-will employment state, meaning your employer can generally change the terms of your employment, including your termination date, at any time and for any lawful reason. Since the agreement is marked "draft" and hasn't been signed by either party, there is no binding contract locking in that May end date. That said, this is the general rule. If you have an employment agreement, offer letter, or other written documentation that guarantees a specific termination date or notice period, that could change the analysis. You would want to review any such documents carefully to confirm whether your employer has already committed to specific terms. There are also some important protections worth knowing about in this context: If you are 40 years of age or older and the severance agreement asks you to waive age discrimination claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), your employer must comply with the Older Workers Benefit Protection Act (OWBPA). Among other things, the OWBPA requires that you be given at least 21 days to review and consider the agreement before signing, or 45 days if you are being terminated as part of a group layoff or reduction in force. You also get a 7-day revocation period after signing during which you can change your mind. Here is the part that may relate to your question: if your employer makes a material change to the agreement, such as moving up your termination date, the review period starts over. So even if you have been sitting with the draft for a couple of weeks, a revised version with a new termination date would likely give you a fresh 21 or 45 day window to consider the updated terms. ***This response is for general information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice or create an attorney-client relationship. For advice specific to your situation, please consult a qualified attorney.***

Sure. It’s wise to have an attorney review any correspondence you’d send to an adversary you’re contemplating legal action against and it is often the case that such a letter when issued on an attorney’s letterhead triggers a response. That said, employment law is tricky since MA is an at will state meaning an employer can terminate for any reason at all outside of racial/sex/orientation bases or retaliation . Obviously there are nuances, but these are the broad strokes.

ContractsCounsel operates as a marketplace connecting clients with attorneys through a competitive bidding process. Here's how it works: You post your legal project on the platform with details about what you need. Attorneys review posted projects and submit bids that include their proposed fees and qualifications. You review the bids, compare attorney profiles and pricing, and select the attorney that best fits your needs and budget. You work directly with your chosen attorney to complete the project. ContractsCounsel does not charge a separate platform fee for clients. You pay only the attorney fee that you agreed to when you accepted their bid. This fee is negotiated directly between you and the attorney through the bidding process. Of course you also have the option to not accept any of the bids. The benefit of this model is that you control costs by reviewing multiple bids and selecting the attorney whose pricing and qualifications match your requirements. I hope that helps! Best regards, Randy

If your Texas home sold for more than what you owed, you may be entitled to what is called surplus or excess funds. These funds are held by the county or trustee after foreclosure. To claim them, you must file a petition for release of surplus funds with proof of ownership and sale details. An attorney can help confirm eligibility and make sure you recover the full amount before others claim it.