How New York’s AVOID Act Could Reshape Construction Litigation - by Roy Schwartz and Harrison Perlstein

New York’s AVOID Act will cause construction attorneys to expedite determining whether or not third-parties should be impleaded. Failure to comply with the AVOID Act’s short timeframes may result in barring third-party claims altogether.  

On December 19, 2025, the "Avoiding Vexatious Overuse of Impleading to Delay” (“AVOID”) act was signed into law and is set place to go into effect on April 18, 2026. This new legislation will impact defendants seeking to bring third-party defendants into a lawsuit. Moving forward, strict deadlines will expedite suing potentially liable parties. 

The AVOID Act revises Civil Practice Law and Rules (“CPLR”) § 1007 (“When Third-Practice Allowed”). As currently written, CPLR § 1007 provides no explicit time restrictions for impleading third-parties.  

The revised CPLR § 1007 requires that, where a third-party defendant’s liability to a direct defendant (for all or part of a plaintiff’s claim) is premised upon contract provisions, the direct defendant must implead the third-party defendant within sixty days of filing the direct defendant’s answer. Second Third-Party claims are given forty-five days; Third Third-Party claims have thirty days, and all subsequent party claims have twenty days. The new CPLR § 1007 contains certain carve-outs, for example, relative to the workers compensation law.  

In circumstances arising outside of a contract provision, the defendant will have sixty days to file and serve a third-party summons and complaint after “becoming aware” that the potential third-party defendant “is or may be liable to the defendant for all or part of a plaintiff’s claim.” This “becoming aware” standard will inevitably become the basis for future dispositive motions on timeliness, as parties debate what triggering event should have given notice that a new party must be impleaded. 

Per the AVOID Act’s stated justification, under the existing CPLR § 1007 (which lacks strict deadlines), “Clever defendants have thus developed an egregious strategy to add years to any case and, during that respite, avoid financial accountability. These defendants deliberately delay the case by impleading known or identifiable third-party defendants into a case on a rolling basis, one after another, etc.” The Sponsor Memo points to discovery beginning “anew” when a party joins a case, thus prolonging litigation. In short, the AVOID Act is intended to expedite a litigation’s resolution and reduce costly gamesmanship.  

The AVOID Act will impact construction litigation. Construction litigation routinely involves third-party and second third-party claims, given the multi-tiered contractual relationships involving developers, construction managers, contractors, subcontractors, suppliers, designers, and subconsultants. Moving forward, once sued, construction defendants will need to immediately collect and review their various contracts to identify potential third-parties.  Construction defendants will need to immediately assess their own potential exposure, the exposure of third parties, contractual obligations, and potential indemnities. Putting aside mere contract review, construction defense attorneys will also be tasked (at this early litigation phase) with investigating whether or not their clients are somehow already on notice of potential third-party defendants who are not in contractual privity. Because these kinds of investigations and analysis can take time, and because the “starting gun” may begin with the defendant’s answer, it is foreseeable that construction defense attorneys will more-frequently request extensions before filing answers. 

As a practical impact of the AVOID Act, risk-adverse, direct defendants will not want to face a court’s ruling that they lost an opportunity to implead third-parties by waiting.  Construction attorneys will need to make judgment calls particularly if the plaintiff’s pleadings contain sparse information about the events giving rise to the lawsuit. Given the AVOID Act’s short time restrictions, a direct defendant will be unable to first receive a plaintiff’s bills of particulars, interrogatory answers, or documents before deciding whether or not to implead certain parties. 

As a result, construction lawsuits may end up with more participants than they otherwise would, and some participants may prove peripheral. Peripheral defendants would need to respond to the lawsuits, possibly file counterclaims and crossclaims, and participate in discovery.  Construction attorneys should anticipate a possible uptick in dispositive motion practice by peripheral third-parties.  
The revised CPLR § 1007 will go into effect on April 18, 2026. 

Roy Schwartz is a partner and Harrison Perlstein is an associate at Zetlin & De Chiara LLP.