2013 New York Consolidated Laws
GBS - General Business
Article 36-A - (770 - 776) HOME IMPROVEMENT CONTRACTS
770 - Definitions.

 
    §  770.  Definitions.  As  used  in this article, the following terms,
  unless  the  context  requires  otherwise,  shall  have  the   following
  meanings:
    1. "Person" means a natural person.
    2.  "Owner"  means  any  homeowner, co-operative shareholder owner, or
  residential tenant, or any person who purchases a custom home as defined
  in this section.
    3. "Home  improvement"  means  the  repairing,  remodeling,  altering,
  converting,  or  modernizing  of, or adding to, residential property and
  shall include, but  not  be  limited  to,  the  construction,  erection,
  replacement,  or  improvement  of  driveways,  swimming  pools,  siding,
  insulation, roofing, windows,  terraces,  patios,  landscaping,  fences,
  porches,  garages,  solar energy systems, flooring, basements, and other
  improvements of the residential property  and  all  structures  or  land
  adjacent to it. "Home improvement" shall also mean the construction of a
  custom   home,  the  installation  of  home  improvement  goods  or  the
  furnishing of home improvement services. "Home  improvement"  shall  not
  include:
    (a)  the  sale or construction of a new home, other than a custom home
  as defined in this section;
    (b) the sale of goods by a seller who neither arranges to perform  nor
  performs,  directly  or indirectly, any work or labor in connection with
  the installation or application of the goods;
    (c)  the  sale  or  installation  of  appliances,  such   as   stoves,
  refrigerators,  freezers,  room  air  conditioners, dishwashers, clothes
  washers or dryers, which are designed to be removable from the  premises
  without material alteration thereof;
    (d)  the sale or installation of decorative goods or services, such as
  draperies and carpets; or
    (e) the  performance  of  repairs,  replacements,  or  other  services
  pursuant  to  an express or implied warranty, or a maintenance agreement
  as defined in section three hundred ninety-five-a of this chapter.
    4. "Home improvement goods or services" means goods and services which
  are bought in connection with home improvement.  Such  home  improvement
  goods and services include burglar alarms, texture coating, fencing, air
  conditioning,  heating equipment, and any other goods which, at the time
  of sale or subsequently, are to be so affixed to real  property  by  the
  home improvement contractor as to become a part of real property whether
  or not severable therefrom.
    5.  "Home  improvement contractor" means a person, firm or corporation
  which owns or operates a home improvement business  or  who  undertakes,
  offers  to undertake or agrees to perform any home improvement for a fee
  and for whom the total  cash  price  of  all  of  his  home  improvement
  contracts  with  all  his  customers  exceeds  one thousand five hundred
  dollars during any period of twelve consecutive months. Home improvement
  contractor does not  include  a  person,  firm,  corporation,  landlord,
  cooperative  corporation, condominium board of managers, joint tenant or
  co-tenant that owns, in whole or in part, the property to be improved.
    6. "Home improvement contract" means an agreement for the  performance
  of home improvement, between a home improvement contractor and an owner,
  and  where  the  aggregate  contract price specified in one or more home
  improvement contracts, including all labor, services and materials to be
  furnished by the  home  improvement  contractor,  exceeds  five  hundred
  dollars.
    7. "Custom home" means a new single family residence to be constructed
  on  premises  owned  of record by the purchaser at the time of contract,
  provided that such residence is intended for  residential  occupancy  by

  such  purchaser and the contract of sale is entered into on or after the
  first day of March, nineteen hundred ninety.