After mold infested their home, Horace and Jennifer Stephens filed a claim under their homeowners insurance policy with Liberty Mutual Fire Insurance Company. To remediate the mold, Liberty Mutual hired Alan V. Mock Construction Company, which in turn sub-contracted some of the work to a sister company, Ser-Clean, Inc.1 After a dispute arose over the remediation work, the Stephens sued Liberty Mutual and Mock Construction, asserting claims for breach of contract, negligence, and conversion. The defendants answered, and Mock Construction also counterclaimed for unpaid rental fees associated with the storage of the Stephens’ belongings during the remediation. The trial court thereafter dismissed with prejudice the Stephens’ claims against Liberty Mutual based on its conclusion that the parties had entered into a binding settlement agreement. The trial court also denied the Stephens’ motion for reconsideration after rejecting their contention that they did not have an adequate opportunity to be heard on the settlement issue. Following further discovery, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Mock Construction on all of the Stephens’ claims and on the counterclaim for unpaid rental fees. The Stephens now appeal these rulings. For the reasons discussed below, we affirm. 1. The Stephens contend that the trial court erred in its decision to enforce their settlement agreement with Liberty Mutual and to deny their motion for reconsideration on the same issue. We disagree. On appeal from a trial court’s order on a motion to enforce a settlement agreement, we apply a de novo standard of review, viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the nonmoving party. The movant must demonstrate that the evidence of record is insufficient to create a jury issue on at least one essential element of the dispute. Citations and punctuation omitted. Matrix Financial Svcs. v. Dean , 288 Ga. App. 666 655 SE2d 290 2007. We will uphold a trial court’s decision granting or denying a motion for reconsideration absent an abuse of discretion. Cochran v. Emory Univ. , 251 Ga. App. 737, 739 2 555 SE2d 96 2001. Guided by these principles, we turn to the record in the present case.
The record shows that the Stephens filed their contract and tort action against Liberty Mutual and Mock Construction in September 2005. Following discovery, Liberty Mutual filed a motion for summary judgment, arguing, among other things, that the contractual limitation period in the homeowners policy had expired prior to the lawsuit being filed.
