Texas RCLA Demand Letter: Contents, Deadlines, and Responses

Before you sue a Texas contractor over a residential construction defect, the Residential Construction Liability Act requires you to send a Texas RCLA demand letter by certified mail at least 60 days before filing.¹ The letter has to describe the defects in reasonable detail, and once the contractor receives it, a structured 60-day window opens for inspection and a possible settlement offer. Get the letter wrong or send it late, and a court will abate your case until you comply.

What the Letter Has to Say

The statute is short on required content. One thing is mandatory: a description of the construction defects in reasonable detail.¹ Identify specific problems you can point to: foundation cracking, water intrusion at a particular wall, faulty wiring in a named circuit, roof leaks over a specific room. General complaints about the house “having problems” won’t satisfy the requirement, and vague notice gives a contractor room to argue later that they never understood what was at stake.

You are not required to state a dollar amount. That’s a common misconception. The statute asks for a description of the defects, not a damages calculation.

Evidence isn’t strictly required either, but withholding it can hurt you. If you already have inspection reports, photographs, or repair estimates that show the nature and cause of the defect, include them. The statute allows a court to give the contractor extra time to respond if the homeowner had available evidence and failed to share it with the original notice.¹ Attaching what you have keeps the timeline on your side.

How to Send It

Send the letter by certified mail, return receipt requested, to the contractor’s last known address.¹ Email doesn’t count. Hand delivery doesn’t count. The return receipt is your proof of delivery, and the date on it is what every deadline in the RCLA process runs from, so keep the green card or the electronic tracking record with your file.

When to Send It

The contractor must receive the letter at least 60 days before you file a lawsuit or initiate arbitration. File early and the court or arbitration tribunal will abate the proceeding until the 60-day period runs out.¹ If a court later realizes proper notice was never sent, it will abate the case even if the limitations period is about to run. You don’t lose the claim, but you lose time.

What the Contractor Can Do After Receiving It

Two things happen inside the 60-day window, and both are on the contractor’s side of the table.

Inspection Request Within 35 Days

The contractor has 35 days from receiving the letter to submit a written request to inspect the property.¹ If they ask, you have to give them a reasonable opportunity to inspect and document the alleged defects. That typically means letting them bring engineers, subcontractors, cameras, and measuring equipment. The statute does not explicitly authorize invasive testing or removing samples, though that may fall within reasonable documentation depending on the defect.

Blocking or unreasonably restricting the inspection is treated the same as rejecting a settlement offer, and that caps your recovery.¹ Cooperate with the inspection even if you already distrust the contractor.

Settlement Offer Within 60 Days

Within 60 days of receiving your letter, the contractor may make a written settlement offer.¹ A valid offer describes the repairs the contractor will perform in reasonable detail. If the work will take more than 60 days, the offer has to include a timeline for completion. The contractor can also offer money in place of or in addition to repairs.

Your 25 Days to Respond

Once you receive the offer, you have 25 days to respond in writing. Accept, and the contractor proceeds with the promised repairs. Reject, and your response must explain in reasonable detail why the offer is inadequate.¹ Silence counts as rejection: if you don’t respond within 25 days, the offer is treated as rejected automatically.

Rejection carries a real cost. If a court later finds the contractor’s offer was reasonable, your recovery is capped at the fair market value of that offer, and you can only recover attorney fees and costs incurred before you rejected it. Litigation spending after the rejection comes out of your pocket.¹ Before you turn down an offer, have someone with construction and legal experience price out what a court is likely to consider reasonable.

When the Contractor Ignores You

Not every contractor engages. If the contractor fails to make a reasonable settlement offer within the 60-day window, the RCLA’s damage caps stop protecting them.¹ The same is true if they accept an offer and then refuse to start the repairs. In either situation you can pursue the full range of recoverable damages in court without the settlement-offer limitation. Silence is worse for the contractor than a low offer.

Defects You Discover Later

Construction problems surface over time. If new defects appear after you’ve sent the original letter, don’t assume the first notice covers them. Send a supplemental demand letter by certified mail describing the newly discovered defect, following the same procedure. If you add a new defect to a pending claim without giving separate notice, the court can give the contractor additional time to inspect and make an offer, and it will treat that late offer as timely for purposes of the settlement rules.¹

When the RCLA Process Doesn’t Apply

The letter requirement runs with claims for damages or relief from a residential construction defect, and it reaches subsequent purchasers who discover defects after buying the home. A few situations fall outside it. Personal injury, survival, and wrongful death claims are not covered. Neither are claims against a contractor who abandoned the project before completion, or claims about statutory lien violations under Chapter 162 of the Texas Property Code.² Mental anguish is not classified as personal injury under the statute, so those claims stay inside the RCLA and still need the letter.

One more trap for homeowners with insurance claims: if an insurer or assignee steps in and has repairs done without first running the RCLA notice and inspection process, the contractor isn’t liable for those repair costs.³ Send the demand letter before letting anyone else fix the problem.

The Outer Deadline

A perfect letter can’t save an untimely claim. Under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.009, suit has to be filed no later than 10 years after substantial completion of the improvement.⁴ That’s a statute of repose, so the clock starts at substantial completion regardless of when you discovered the defect.

Three extensions are worth knowing. If the damage occurs in the final year of the 10-year window, you get two additional years from the date it arises. If you present a written claim to the contractor before the 10-year deadline, the period extends by two years from the date you presented it. And the repose period doesn’t apply at all to claims based on a written warranty that runs longer, or to claims involving willful misconduct or fraudulent concealment.⁴ If you’re anywhere near the 10-year mark, get the letter out by certified mail now; the presentment itself buys you time.

1
State of Texas. Texas Property Code PROP 27.004 – Notice and Offer of Settlement
2
State of Texas. Texas Property Code PROP 27.002 – Applicability
3
State of Texas. Texas Property Code PROP 27.003 – Contractor Liability
4
State of Texas. Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.009