Florida GC License EXPERIENCE????

lou187

I have a question to all the Florida certified GC's....My friend took the GC exam last year and passed but still does not hold the license. He is a pretty large contractor that just completes retail renovations mostly mall work. He has been hung up on the experience part, 4 years experience with slab/ foundation, steel, cmu etc. I told him I think you took the wrong exam. I decided to look into this myself and realized he was correct. It seems like we have a gap between the residential and commercial license with no inbetween license for someone who is a GC but only completes interior renovations and does not mess with the structure of the building. He consideres himself a GC as would I but maybe in Florida a GC is only considered if you build out of the ground. I am confused He is livid

Anyways I new this would be the place to post this question.

Thanks in advance...

Staging

Tough for your friend. I know its tough but yeah he is correct that is what Florida requires. Does he have another GC willing to sign for him? That is another requirement that he needs.

macatawacab

What test did he pass? State exam or County exam. There are three levels of GC in the State. Residential. Builder, and Unlimited.

If he passed Residential he is out of luck in a mall. He would need Builder or Unlimited for commercial work. These things are clearly spelled out when you register for the state exam. Don't know about the County.

lou187

He did not even get into that part of it with me but from all of the research I have done I am pretty sure he would go the architect route being that he works with many. This has been a great learning EXPERIENCE for me because I will be going this year to take the exam.

lou187

He took unlimited. All the research I did I have found out that the test is the same for builder and unlimited and the experience is the same as well, except for the fact for unlimited you need to show experience on a 4 or more story building. (from what I gather anyway)

bwalley

He doesn't need all of the 4 years experience to be in slab/foundation, Steel, CMU etc.

If he doesn't have the experience on a 4 story or greater building, he could get the Certified Building Contractors license, that will allow him to do buildouts on any size building, he would just be limited to structural work of 3 stories or less.

aallogia

I am currently having the same problem and have decided to use a service to assist me in getting the license. I wonder if anyone has had any good or bad experiences with license services?