Contracts
Basics for Your Business
About the Creekmore Law Firm
Practice Areas
- Intellectual Property
- Business Counseling
- Business Litigation
- Appeals
- Criminal Defense
Offices in Blacksburg and Richmond
Overview
- What is a contract?
- What are some of the kinds of clauses in a contract?
- What kinds of business contracts are there?
- How might a breach occur?
- What are the remedies for a breach?
- What defenses are there?
What is a contract?
- Private law binding parties
- Requires:
- Mutual assent
- bargained-for exchange
- Consideration
- Offer-acceptance
- Doesn’t have to be in writing…except when it does
What are some of the kinds of clauses in a contract?
- indemnity
- warranty
- liquidated damages
- curing
- dispute resolution
- attorney’s fees
- jurisdiction
- venue
- choice of law
What kinds of business contracts are there?
- Commercial lease
- Sale of goods
- Service contracts
- Non-competition agreements
- License agreements
- Employment agreements
- Or whatever you like…
How might a breach occur?
By a failure to perform, but….
- Is there a condition precedent to performance?
- Is an obligation ambiguous?
- Is the breach a minor breach?
- Is the breach a material breach?
What are the remedies for a breach?
- May depend on what the contract says
- Damages first, equitable relief second
- May require…
- alternative dispute resolution
- trial in a specific jurisdiction
- no jury
- and other limitations stipulated in the contract
- And you might settle the matter out of court, which is itself a contract
What contract defenses are there?
- No contract actually existed…
- Mutual mistake
- Failure of the other party to perform
- An anticipatory repudiation of the contract
- Frustration of purpose or a “force majeure” event
- Unconscionability
- Contract illegality
- Fraud
- Impossibility or impracticability