Going to need to sue the builder on the ranch project. Rick and I have been having an awful week dealing with a certified letter we got from our engineering firm on some malfeasance by a subcontractor. This is going to get super ugly at this point. Lawyer is having a field-day because this is a sue for damages type deal where he gets a big payday if we have to take them to court, and inevitably win, based on the evidence we have.
Having lawyers in the family and without knowing the details I would advise caution on a lawsuit unless it cannot be avoided.
They can take years cost ridiculous sums to the degree that only the lawyers are happy and even if you win a big judgement many small builders will often have little in the way of assets on the books and just declare bankruptcy as it can be cheeper to just start a new company rather than pay.
Often it’s best to make a lot of noise show them you have evidence of wrongdoing, convince them you will sue and then once they are paying attention give them an opportunity to make things right via negotiation in return for you dropping the threat of legal action.