Part 1 General Provisions 66-11-101 – 66-11-150
Part 2 Truth in Construction and Consumer Protection Act of 1975 66-11-201 – 66-11-208
Need help reviewing a real estate contract? Chat with an attorney and protect your rights.

Terms Used In Tennessee Code > Title 66 > Chapter 11 - Mechanics' and Materialmen's Liens

  • Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
  • Affirmed: In the practice of the appellate courts, the decree or order is declared valid and will stand as rendered in the lower court.
  • Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
  • Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
  • Contract: means an agreement for improving real property, written or unwritten, express or implied, and includes extras as defined in this section. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Contract price: means the amount agreed upon by the contracting parties to be paid for performing work or labor or for furnishing materials, machinery, equipment, services, overhead and profit, included in the contract, increased or diminished by the price of extras or breach of contract, including defects in workmanship or materials. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
  • Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
  • Elderly adult: means a person seventy (70) years of age or older. See Tennessee Code 39-15-501
  • Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. Source: U.S. Courts
  • Extras: means labor, materials, services, equipment, machinery, overhead and profit, for improving real property, authorized by the owner and not included in previous contracts. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Foreclosure: A legal process in which property that is collateral or security for a loan may be sold to help repay the loan when the loan is in default. Source: OCC
  • Furnish materials: means :
    (i) To supply materials that are intended to be and are incorporated in the improvement. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
  • Improvement: means the result of any action or any activity in furtherance of constructing, erecting, altering, repairing, demolishing, removing, or furnishing materials or labor for any building, structure, appurtenance to the building or structure, fixture, bridge, driveway, private roadway, sidewalk, walkway, wharf, sewer, utility, watering system, or other similar enhancement, or any part thereof, on, connected with, or beneath the surface. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Laborer: means any individual who, under contract, of any degree of remoteness, personally performs labor for improving real property on the site of the improvement. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
  • Lienor: means any person having a lien or right of lien on real property by virtue of this chapter, and includes the person's successor in interest. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
  • Mortgagee: The person to whom property is mortgaged and who has loaned the money.
  • Mortgagor: The person who pledges property to a creditor as collateral for a loan and who receives the money.
  • nursery stock: means all trees, shrubs, or other plants, or parts of such trees, shrubs or other plants, grown or kept for, or capable of, propagation, distribution or sale on a commercial basis. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
  • Oath: includes affirmation. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
  • Oath: A promise to tell the truth.
  • Obtain: includes , but is not limited to, the taking, carrying away or the sale, conveyance or transfer of title to or interest in or possession of property, and includes, but is not limited to, conduct known as larceny, larceny by trick, larceny by conversion, embezzlement, extortion or obtaining property by false pretenses. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
  • Owner: includes the owner in fee of real property, or of a less estate in real property, a lessee for a term of years, a vendee in possession under a contract for the purchase of real property, and any person having any right, title or interest, legal or equitable, in real property, that may be sold under process. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Perform: when used in connection with the words labor or services, means performance by the lienor or by another for the lienor. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Person: includes the singular and the plural and means and includes any individual, firm, partnership, copartnership, association, corporation, governmental subdivision or agency, or other organization or other legal entity, or any agent or servant thereof. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
  • Person: means an individual, corporation, limited liability company, partnership, limited partnership, sole proprietorship, joint venture, association, trust, estate, or other legal or commercial entity. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
  • Prime contractor: means a person, including a land surveyor as defined in §. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Real property: includes real estate, lands, tenements and hereditaments, corporeal and incorporeal, and fixtures and improvements thereon. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
  • Remote contractor: means a person, including a land surveyor as defined in §. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Representative: when applied to those who represent a decedent, includes executors and administrators, unless the context implies heirs and distributees. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
  • Settlement: Parties to a lawsuit resolve their difference without having a trial. Settlements often involve the payment of compensation by one party in satisfaction of the other party's claims.
  • Visible commencement of operations: means the first actual work of improving upon the land or the first delivery to the site of the improvement of materials, that remain on the land until actually incorporated in the improvement, of such manifest and substantial character as to notify interested persons that an improvement is being made or is about to be made on the land, excluding, however, demolition, surveying, excavating, clearing, filling or grading, placement of sewer or drainage lines or other utility lines or work preparatory therefor, erection of temporary security fencing and the delivery of materials therefor. See Tennessee Code 66-11-101
  • Vulnerable adult: means a person eighteen (18) years of age or older who, because of intellectual disability or physical dysfunction, is unable to fully manage the person's own resources, carry out all or a portion of the activities of daily living, or fully protect against neglect, exploitation, or hazardous or abusive situations without assistance from others. See Tennessee Code 39-15-501
  • Writ: A formal written command, issued from the court, requiring the performance of a specific act.