contract assignment and assumption

Assignment and Assumption Agreements: Comprehensive Guide

LegalGPS : Jul. 29, 2024

Running a successful business is all about staying on top of your game—and that includes being able to navigate legally complex situations with ease. One concept that often comes up in the world of contracts is the assignment and assumption agreement. If you're a business owner who needs a quick yet comprehensive rundown of what an assignment and assumption agreement is and how to create one, you've come to the right place.

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In this guide, we'll walk you through the ins and outs of assignment and assumption agreements, and even provide you with a step-by-step explanation of how to put one together. So grab your favorite cup of coffee and let's get started!

Being able to efficiently manage and transfer contractual rights and obligations is crucial for businesses of all sizes. Whether you're selling a portion of your company or entering into a new partnership, having a solid assignment and assumption agreement in place can save you time, resources, and potential legal headaches down the line.

That being said, it's important to ensure that your assignment and assumption agreement is accurate, comprehensive, and tailored to suit your specific needs. And that's where this guide comes in. We'll help you understand the role of assignment and assumption agreements in your business and give you the tools you need to create one with confidence.

What is an Assignment and Assumption Agreement?

Before we dive into the nitty-gritty of creating an assignment and assumption agreement , it's important to understand what it is and why it's important for your business. In simple terms, an assignment and assumption agreement is a legal document that transfers the rights and obligations of one party (the "assignor") in an existing transactional agreement contract to another party (the "assignee"). Essentially, it allows one party to step out of a contract and another party to step in, taking over the original party's rights and responsibilities.

An assignment and assumption agreement typically serves a few key purposes, including:

Transferring ownership or control of assets

Refinancing debt or other financial arrangements

Splitting or consolidating business entities

A well-crafted agreement not only helps ensure a smooth transition but also protects all parties involved from potential misunderstandings and disputes.

The Importance of an Accurate Assignment and Assumption Agreement

Now that you have an idea of what an assignment and assumption agreement entails, let's talk about why it's so important to get it right. Without a solid agreement in place, both the assignor and the assignee can face a whole host of problems, from miscommunications to legal disputes.

For one, an unclear or vague agreement can leave both parties open to misinterpretation and misunderstanding, which can result in disputes down the line. This is especially true when considerable assets or financial interests are at stake—having an accurate agreement in place helps protect both parties from future legal battles.

Moreover, without an agreement that specifically assigns rights and obligations to the assignee, the original parties to the contract may still be bound by its terms. This can give rise to unwanted legal complications and may even defeat the purpose of entering into the assignment and assumption agreement in the first place.

In short, a well-written assignment and assumption agreement protects both parties and helps prevent future misunderstandings and disputes.

Comprehensive transactional guides and templates

How to Write an Assignment and Assumption Agreement: Step-by-Step Guide

Now that we've covered why having an accurate assignment and assumption agreement is so crucial, let's walk through how to write one. Keep in mind that every contract is unique, so your agreement should be tailored to your specific situation.

Step 1: Identifying Parties and their Roles

The first step in creating an assignment and assumption agreement is to clearly identify the parties involved and their respective roles. This typically includes the assignor, assignee, and the original counterparty to the contract (the "obligor"). Be sure to include the legal names and contact information for each party, including any business entities, individuals, or other parties that may be involved.

Moreover, all parties should be represented by a lawyer who is licensed to practice law in the state where the property is located.

Step 2: Describing the Original Contract

The next step is to describe the original contract being assigned and assumed, also known as the "underlying contract." This should include a brief description of the terms and conditions of the underlying contract, as well as the date on which it was executed. You may also want to include a reference to the specific section(s) of the underlying contract that permit assignment, if applicable.

For example, if the underlying contract is a lease agreement, you may want to point out that the lease allows for assignment.

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Step 3: Detailing the Assignment and Assumption

Now, it's time to get into the heart of the agreement—the actual assignment and assumption. In this section, you'll need to outline the specific rights and obligations being transferred from the assignor to the assignee, including any limitations or conditions related to the transfer.

You should also identify the effective date of the assignment and assumption, which may be the date on which the agreement is executed, or a later date specified by the parties. In some cases, you may also need to consider any rights or obligations that will remain with the assignor after the assignment and assumption take effect.

Step 4: Consent of the Obligor

In some cases, the assignment and assumption of a contract may require the consent of the obligor. If this is the case, you should include a section in your agreement describing the obligor's consent, including any conditions or limitations on the consent, if applicable.

This is important because if the obligor does not consent or if there are conditions on the consent, it may prevent your assignment and assumption from taking effect.

Step 5: Governing Law and Jurisdiction

It's crucial to establish which laws will govern your assignment and assumption agreement, in case any disputes arise later on. Include a section specifying the state or country whose laws will apply to the agreement, as well as the jurisdiction where any legal disputes will be resolved.

However, make sure the law you choose is not one that would be considered unfair to either party. For example, if one of your companies is based in a state that has laws favorable to creditors and the other company is based in a state with more favorable laws for debtors, it may be best to choose another state as your governing law.

Step 6: Signatures

Finally, the last step in creating an assignment and assumption agreement is to have all parties sign and date the document. This is typically done at the end of the agreement, after all terms and conditions have been outlined. Be sure to include lines for the signatures of the assignor, assignee, and the obligor (if their consent is required), as well as a space for each party to print their name and title, if applicable.

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Pros and Cons of Using an Assignment and Assumption Agreement Template

When it comes to creating an assignment and assumption agreement, you might be considering using a contract template. While templates definitely have their advantages, such as saving time and ensuring that you cover all of the necessary legal bases, there are also some potential downsides to be aware of.

One major advantage of using a template is that it can save you time by providing a well-structured starting point for your agreement. Templates also generally include the essential sections and clauses that most agreements need, helping to ensure that your agreement is legally compliant and thorough.

The main disadvantage of using a generic template is that it may not be tailored precisely to your specific needs. This can result in an agreement that doesn't fully address the nuances of your situation or provide adequate protection for all parties involved. If you're unsure about whether a template is appropriate for your situation, you should consider consulting a legal professional or purchasing a customizable contract template that can be adapted to your specific circumstances.

The Benefits of Choosing Our Contract Template

There's no doubt that a well-designed contract template can be a game-changer when it comes to drafting assignment and assumption agreements. And that's where our expertly crafted template comes into play. Here's what sets our template apart:

Simplified language for easier understanding

Customizable to suit your specific needs and requirements

By choosing our contract template, you can feel confident knowing that you're getting a legally compliant and strategically sound agreement that's tailored to your situation. So why wait? Purchase our expertly designed assignment and assumption agreement template and ensure your business's success today!

In the world of business, contracts play a crucial role in protecting your assets and interests. And when it comes to assignment and assumption agreements, accuracy and clarity are key. We hope this comprehensive guide has given you the tools and understanding you need to confidently create your own assignment and assumption agreements.

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Table of Contents

The Importance of an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

How to Write an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

Pros and Cons of an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

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What is an Assignment and Assumption Agreement: Everything You Need to Know

An assignment and assumption agreement is an agreement for transferring contractual duties and rights. 3 min read updated on January 01, 2024

“What is an assignment and assumption agreement?” is a question that you may find yourself asking if you intend to end your involvement in contract by letting another person step into your shoes. An assignment and assumption agreement is an agreement for transferring contractual duties and rights. It is a separate agreement from the one being transferred. The original contract may contain certain terms and conditions regarding assignments and assumptions, so it is important for the parties involved to review the contract carefully before proceeding with the transfer.

What Is an Assignment and Assumption Agreement?

Also referred to as an assignment and assumption, an assignment and assumption agreement is an agreement that is established when one party of a contract wishes to transfer his or her contractual obligations and rights to another party. The party who is transferring his or her rights is called the assignor, while the one receiving them is known as the assignee.

In some situations, an assignor will not be completely released from liability even after he or she has assigned the contract. The parties should look closely at the specific language in the contract to determine the restrictions and terms that apply to assignments and assumptions. An agreement for an assignment and assumption is a document that is separate from the contract it transfers.

Reasons for Creating an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

After two parties enter into a contract, a change in business climate, one party's equity, or other factors may make it necessary to assign the contract. If both parties agree to the assignment and sign the necessary documents to transfer existing duties and interests, an agreement may be assigned to and assumed by another party.

A business may lose its foothold in the marketplace or one of contracting parties may fail to perform its contractual obligations due to changing local laws. Instead of leaving parties bound to an irrelevant or dated agreement , an assignment makes it possible for struggling or incapable parties to be replaced with parties that are more capable of responding to the requirements and goals of the contract. The process of assignment itself enables the parties to continue a dialogue, which can help develop and solidify a successful business relationship.

A Guide to Creating an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

Sometimes, a contract may have specific rules regarding what type of assignment is permitted, who can receive the assignment, and how the assignment should be processed. It is essential that you read the original contract to ensure that all contracting parties have met all the requirements for assignments and assumptions. Each party should be given enough time to review both the initial agreement and the assignment. This will help prevent the situation where one party claims that he or she does not understand the terms and their effect on the agreement or his or her rights and duties.

In addition, you and the other party should carefully review the assignment to make sure that it includes all relevant deal points. Avoid assuming that both parties have agreed to certain terms or expectations even if they are not clearly stated in the document. It is better to over-include than under-include terms in the agreement. Since the terms of the initial agreement are still effective, both parties should continue to fulfill their contractual obligations until the assignment is signed and completed.

Three copies of the assignment and assumption agreement must be signed: two for the initial contracting parties and one for the assignee. Your copy of the signed assignment agreement should be kept with the original agreement. Once the assignment is created and signed, it will become part of the initial contract and should be treated as such. Depending on the terms of the agreement , you may want to have the assignment witnessed or notarized. By doing so, you can avoid the situation where someone challenges the validity of a signature.

What to Include in an Assignment and Assumption Agreement

An assignment and assumption agreement can be written in many different ways. In many instances, such an agreement includes the following:

Names of assignor and assignee
Whereas clause stating that both assignor and assignee have agreed to the assignment
Statement of assignment
Statement of assumption
Effective date of assignment
Statement about future transfers and assignments to permitted successors
Declaration that the agreement can be executed in counterparts
Statement confirming the presence of witnesses
Signatures of the assignor and assignee

If you need help drafting an assignment and assumption agreement, you can post your legal need on UpCounsel's marketplace. UpCounsel accepts only the top 5 percent of lawyers to its site. Lawyers on UpCounsel come from law schools such as Harvard Law and Yale Law and average 14 years of legal experience, including work with or on behalf of companies like Google, Menlo Ventures, and Airbnb.

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Assumption Agreement: Definition, Example

Jump to section, what is an assumption agreement.

An assumption agreement, sometimes called an assignment and assumption agreement, is a legal document that allows one party to transfer rights and/or obligations to another party. It allows one party to "assume" the rights and responsibilities of the other party. This agreement is often used in real estate transactions and mortgage lending.

A seller may include an assumption agreement in order to provide legal protection by transferring obligations to a buyer. If a buyer then decides to default on a mortgage or otherwise go against the contract, the original seller would not be held liable.

Assumption Agreement Sample

Reference : Security Exchange Commission - Edgar Database, EX-10 8 exhibit107.htm ASSUMPTION AGREEMENT , Viewed October 13, 2021, View Source on SEC .

Who Helps With Assumption Agreements?

Lawyers with backgrounds working on assumption agreements work with clients to help. Do you need help with an assumption agreement?

Post a project in ContractsCounsel's marketplace to get free bids from lawyers to draft, review, or negotiate assumption agreements. All lawyers are vetted by our team and peer reviewed by our customers for you to explore before hiring.

ContractsCounsel is not a law firm, and this post should not be considered and does not contain legal advice. To ensure the information and advice in this post are correct, sufficient, and appropriate for your situation, please consult a licensed attorney. Also, using or accessing ContractsCounsel's site does not create an attorney-client relationship between you and ContractsCounsel.

Meet some of our Assumption Agreement Lawyers

The Castro Law Firm, located in Royal Palm Beach, Florida, provides a range of legal services to clients that focus on probate, estate plannnig and business matters. Our staff is fluent in Spanish. We offer free consultations and virtual appointments.

I build legal solutions which create extraordinary value for my clients. I am a partner in Alliance Law Firm International PLLC in Washington. My specialties include tax, wealth management, estates, corporations/business, venture capital, private equity, and natural resources. Prior to practicing law, I had a decade-long career in international private equity and investment banking. I have worked on building and managing companies in technology, energy, materials, retail, and natural resources. I am licensed to practice in the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania. I have degrees from the Georgetown University Law Center (JD) and the Yale School of Management (MBA).

I am a Silicon Valley tech lawyer with over 13 years of in-house experience and additional years in BigLaw. I provide tech licensing, data privacy, employment, international expansion, go to market, and other corporate and commercial legal services to clients in software, SaaS, bio-tech, cryptocurrency, financing, and construction business. I currently run my own practice concentrating on transactional, commercial, corporate or employment matters. Prior to starting my own practice, I joined as the first in-house counsel to lead the global legal strategy to bring tech products to market, increase revenue, decrease exposure to risk, and raise venture funding for HashiCorp Inc., currently an unicorn technology company with evaluation over $5 billion and venture funding over $350 million; Sysdig Inc., a technology company with venture funding of $195 million; and Anaplan Inc., currently a publicly traded company on the US Stock Market. Furthermore, I acted as in-house counsel advising leading technology enterprise companies such as HP, VMware, and Genentech and currently act as member of strategic advisory boards to several technology companies located globally

I'm a tenants rights attorney based (and licensed) in New York. My expertise includes filing complaints and responsive pleadings as well as reviewing leases and contracts and motion practice.

Artem (Art) V.

Art is an attorney licensed to practice in New York, specializing in business and corporate law. His expertise encompasses a wide range of services, including corporate governance, finance transactions, contractual issues, non-disclosure agreements, intellectual property, and privacy matters. Art's professional experience also includes advising institutional lenders in the commercial real estate sector on financing, restructuring, and workout projects. Passionate about supporting the growth and development of start-ups, as well as small and mid-sized corporations, Art offers customized legal solutions for a broad spectrum of concerns related to corporate matters, contracts, and general business affairs. His approach is tailored to meet the unique needs of each client, ensuring comprehensive support in navigating the complexities of the legal landscape.

Tayane M. Oliveira is a founding partner at Vannucci Oliveira. With a concentration in family law, Tayane is renowned for her commitment to providing compassionate yet powerful representation to her clients. Her experience as an associate attorney at Brodzki Jacobs & Brook, coupled with her unwavering dedication to her clients' welfare, prepared her for her current role at Vannucci Oliveira. Tayane's academic achievements are a testament to her rigorous intellectual curiosity and dedication to her profession. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Criminal Justice, supplemented by a minor in Psychology, from Florida Atlantic University in 2013. The culmination of her academic pursuit came in 2017, when she earned her Juris Doctor degree, cum laude, from the esteemed Nova Southeastern University's Shepard Broad College of Law. Before co-founding Vannucci Oliveira, Tayane honed her skills in the heat of the courtroom, representing clients in an array of general civil litigation matters. This diversified exposure instilled in her an ability to tackle complex legal challenges, a skill she employs to benefit her clients in family law. Originally from Brazil, Tayane brings an international perspective to her practice. When not delving into legal briefs or advocating for her clients, she indulges in travelling, reading, spoiling her puppies, and exercising, activities that not only rejuvenate her but also provide her with a broader perspective on the world and her practice. *Supreme Court Certified Portuguese Speaking Mediator

P. McCoy Smith is the Founding Attorney at Lex Pan Law LLC, a full-service technology and intellectual property law firm based in Portland, Oregon, U.S.A and Opsequio LLC, an open source compliance consultancy. Prior to his current position, he spent 20 years in the legal department of a Fortune 50 multinational technology company as a business unit intellectual property specialist; among his duties was setting up the free & open source legal function and policies for that company. He preceded his in-house experience with 8 years in private practice in a large New York City-based boutique intellectual property law firm, working simultaneously as a U.S. patent litigator and U.S. patent prosecutor. He was also a patent examiner at the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office prior to attending law school. He is licensed to practice law in Oregon, California & New York and to prosecute patent applications in the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office; he is also a registered Trademark and Patent Agent with the Canadian Intellectual Property Office. He has degrees from Colorado State University (Bachelor of Science, Mechanical Engineering, with honors), Johns Hopkins University (Masters of Liberal Arts) and the University of Virginia (Juris Doctor). While in private practice, and continuing into his in-house career, he taught portions of the U.S. patent bar exam for a long-standing and well-known patent bar exam preparation course, and from 2014-2020 was on the editorial board of the Journal of Open Law, Technology & Society (JOLTS), and starting in 2023 will be on the editorial board of the American Intellectual Property Law Quarterly Journal (AIPLAQJ). He is the author or co-author of chapters on open source and copyright and patents in “Open Source Law, Policy & Practice” (2022, Oxford University Press). He lectures frequently around the world on free and open source issues as well as other intellectual property topics.

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Assignment and assumption agreement

What is an assignment and assumption agreement?

An assignment and assumption agreement is a contract that allows one of the parties to transfer their contractual rights and duties to another party.

An assignment of contract is used after a previous agreement has been signed and one of the parties wants to pass on its obligations to a third party that wasn\’t originally part of the contract.

The parties involved in an assignment of contract are:

Uses of assignment agreements

Asset purchase transactions.

During mergers and acquisitions , the parties typically enter into additional agreements that are accessory to the purchase contract to evidence the transfer of assets. Among these ancillary documents is the assignment and assumption agreement, which may be required to make the Asset Purchase Agreement (APA) effective.

In the context of a business transaction, the assignment and assumption agreement is a shorter agreement than the APA. A buyer will use the assignment contract to evidence the ownership of the assigned assets, while the seller uses it to prove that it is the buyer who now has assumed all the rights and obligations related to the assigned asset.

In asset acquisitions, it is common to have several assignment agreements that are used to authenticate the property of different assets, such as patents, trademarks, or copyrights.

Opting out of a contract

If the party of a contract is no longer able to fulfill its obligations or wants to cede its rights to someone else, assignment agreements can come into place. Only if the terms of the original contract allow it, the assignor can transfer its property rights and obligations or debt to someone else.

An example could be a contractor who needs help to complete a job and assigns tasks and entitlements to a subcontractor.

Startup Assignment Agreements

Assignment contracts are typically used by newly formed businesses that rely on software, trademarks, or other sort of intellectual property. Since technology startups expect financing from outside investors, a technology attorney will usually recommend the use of assignment agreements as a means of ensuring third parties, such as shareholders, can profit from using their IP and make it easier to find funding for their businesses.

Conditions for an assignment contract to be valid

To be able to hand over the contractual obligations, the following criteria need to be met:

It’s essential to notice that, although assigning a contract will transfer the rights and duties to the receiving party, the assignor will not be released from any obligations that arose before the assignment. Before entering a contract assignment, ensure a contract review lawyer advises you it is safe to proceed, how to do it, and if you will be still liable for specific terms in the contract.

An assignment will not be enforced if:

Elements of an Assignment Agreement

Details on the existing agreement: Provides identification data on the existing contract, such as its date of execution and purpose.

Additionally, the assignment contract will contain provisions related to indemnification and governing law.

In M&A, when in need to prove the ownership of specific assets, or if you are facing difficulties in fulfilling your contractual obligations, an assignment and assumption agreement will demonstrate you are the right owner and keep your business’s credibility intact.