ABA Family Legal Guide

Contracts and Consumer Law

Introduction to Contracts

Limits to a Contract

What are statutes of limitations?

These are laws setting time limits during which a lawsuit can be brought. The typical deadline for bringing a contract action is six years from the time the breach occurs. The idea of this policy is that everyone is entitled, at some point, to close the book on a transaction. It encourages people to move on and reduces the uncertainty that businesses, for example, would face if they could be sued for breaching contracts that no one in the organization remembers.