Preliminary notices in Wyoming
Subcontractors and suppliers on a private job in Wyoming serve a notice of right to lien to owner within 30 days after your first day furnishing labor or materials. It is required. That is longer than most states that set a fixed window (the middle is about 26 days), but a late notice can still cost you.
Before recording, GCs, subcontractors and suppliers send a notice of intent to lien at least 20 days before the last day to record the lien. Because it counts back from the deadline, waiting until the last week can leave you too late to record at all.
Lien filing deadline in Wyoming
If the GC hired you, you have 120 days after your last day furnishing labor or materials to record a mechanics lien in Wyoming, about 30 days longer than the national median of 90 days (counted from last furnishing on a sample job). 9 of the 51 jurisdictions we track use this same lien deadline.
The clock starts on your last day furnishing labor or materials under your contract. In many states, warranty visits and punch list work done mainly to extend the deadline don't restart it, so use your last day of real contract work.
If you're the GC, in contract with the owner, you have 150 days after your last day furnishing labor or materials instead.
Deadline to sue on the lien
To keep the lien alive you must sue to enforce it within 180 days after recording the lien. If you record on the last possible day, that is about 300 days after your last day on the job, about 65 days shorter than the national median of 365 days. 18 of the 48 jurisdictions we track have a shorter overall time to sue and 29 have a longer one.
Because the clock counts from recording, recording early also moves the lawsuit deadline earlier.
How Wyoming compares
Days are counted on a sample job with the lien recorded on its last allowed day, so states that count from recording or from completion can be compared with those that count from your last day on site. The median is across the jurisdictions with a dated rule on file.
- Preliminary notice (from first day)
- Wyoming: 30 daysNational median: 25.5 days
- Record the lien (from last day)
- Wyoming: 120 daysNational median: 90 days
- Sue to enforce (from last day)
- Wyoming: 300 daysNational median: 365 days
Public and federal projects
Public property can't be liened, so subcontractors and suppliers on state and local public jobs in Wyoming claim against the GC's payment bond instead. We haven't reduced Wyoming's bond claim deadlines to one set of numbers, because they vary by agency and project. The governing law is Wyo. Stat. §16-6-112 to -121. Verify the notice and suit deadlines with the statute and the bond itself before the job starts.
Federal jobs in Wyoming follow the Miller Act instead of state law: those hired by a sub or supplier give the prime contractor notice within 90 days of their last furnishing, and suit is due within 1 year, in federal court. Prime contractors on federal work have no lien or bond claim.
Retainage and prompt payment in Wyoming
We haven't reduced Wyoming's retainage and prompt payment rules to single numbers yet: they depend on the agency, the contract size or the contract date. Rather than guess, the table shows "Verify" and the statutes to read are Wyo. Stat. §16-6-701 to -708 (public). Your contract's payment terms still matter, and the federal rules below apply on federal work.
| Public work | Private work | Federal work | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Retainage cap | Verify | Verify | 10% |
| Release | Verify with state statute | Verify with state statute | Released with final payment, or earlier once progress is satisfactory. |
| GC pays subs within | Verify | Verify | 7 days |
| Late-payment interest | Verify | Verify | Treasury prompt payment rate (reset every January and July) |
Not legal advice. Retainage and prompt payment rules differ by agency, contract size and contract date, and change often. Confirm the rules with the current statute, your contract and a construction attorney before relying on them.
Worked example: a painting sub in Wyoming
A painting subcontractor hired by the GC on a private distribution warehouse in Wyoming starts work on March 2, 2026 and last furnishes on July 17, 2026. The project is completed on August 28, 2026. Run through Wyoming's rules, those dates give:
| Deadline | Date | Counted from |
|---|---|---|
| Notice of right to lien to owner | April 1, 2026 Verify | First furnishing |
| Notice of intent to lien (20 days before filing) | October 25, 2026 Weekend | The lien deadline |
| Record the lien | November 14, 2026 Weekend | Last furnishing |
| Sue to enforce the lien | May 13, 2027 | Lien recording |
The first deadline on the calendar is “Notice of right to lien to owner” on April 1, 2026, counted from the day the crew started, long before any payment is late.
2 dates land on a weekend (October 25, 2026, November 14, 2026). Not every state rolls a deadline to Monday, so the safe move is to record or serve by the Friday before.
Rows marked "Verify" depend on facts or readings we can't settle for you. Check them against Wyo. Stat. §29-1-301 to -391.
Open the lien deadline calculator for Wyoming and enter your own dates to get this table for your job, with countdowns and a PDF deadline calendar.
Check your own dates with the free tools
- Mechanics lien and notice deadline calculator (WY): every notice, lien and suit date for your role, tier and job type.
- Retainage and prompt payment rules (WY): check your contract's retainage against the cap and work out late-payment interest.
- Schedule of values and pay application builder: bill each period with retainage calculated, so what you're owed is documented.
- Cash flow and retainage forecaster: see what slow payment and held retainage do to your bank balance.
Statutes cited
- Wyo. Stat. §29-1-301 to -391
- Wyo. Stat. §16-6-112 to -121 (public bonds)
- Wyo. Stat. §16-6-701 to -708 (public)
- Federal work in Wyoming: 40 U.S.C. §3131 to §3134 (Miller Act)
Not legal advice. Lien and bond claim rules change and have exceptions for project type, contract terms and how notices are served. Confirm every deadline with the current statute or a construction attorney in the project's state before relying on it. Rules shown as "Verify with state statute" have exceptions or variations we could not reduce to one number.