Where parties negotiate and reject a particular contractual arrangement (here, a cost plus building contract) before executing a written agreement, evidence of that rejection is admissible under the Codelfa exception to negative an inference that the written agreement imposed the rejected obligation. The nature of a party's obligations under a building contract is to be determined by viewing the contract as a whole, not by adopting a starting position based on the form of contract used and asking whether modifications altered that position.
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