Ga. License Question

Alanjay

I have a question in regards to the Ga. License which actually may be able to be answered by others outside of Ga.

The question is:

The individual license versus the agency license. If one cannot get appoved for the agency type license due to the banks not willing to open lines of credit for small bsuinesses and most starting out small businesses not having a net worthg of 150K. The individual has to apply as an individual - correct? What can be done with the individual license. Can one work for a company that is not licensed? In my reading it says that an individual can work as a Sole Proprietor in ones own name. That would open that person up to liabilities would it not.

I hope this opens a good discussion because it is confusing to me or either I am making it harder than it has to be (which I have been known to do).

Alan

Bob Kovacs

You only need to show a net worth of $150k for the "general contractor" classification- not for the "residential" or "residential/light commercial" classifications. Unless you're planning on building some large commercial projects (which you really shouldn't be anyway if you can't show a $150k net worth) you don't need the full-blown "general contractor" classification, so you're fine.

Alanjay

Showing a net worth of 150K is not the problem. On the individual license it is personal net worth. For the applying agent it is the networth of the business. Which when starting new is harder to do. I just do not want to get into one and not be able to use it. I have a LLC already set up. So I would like to work for it. Can I do this with an individual license?

Alan

Plus most of my experience comes from the big commercial side of construction. So I am qualified for the unlimited one so I would think that is what to do so I can do whatever as the business grows.

Bob Kovacs

If you get an individual license, you can only operate as a sole proprietor, which you don't want to do- you want to get the agency license, which allows you to be the qualifier for the LLC. You'll have to figure out a way to have the LLC show the $150k net worth. You can "work for" the LLC as a licensed individual, but the LLC can't sign a contract without being licensed with a QA, so you've got to go the QA route.

Alanjay

Thanks Bob for the answer - that is what I was looking for. I went back to the SOS site and saw a GC Limited Tier license. I do have the ability to do that one and I can move it up to the Tier license when hte business grows.

Bob Kovacs

That whole "tier" thing is new- it seems they've made some recent changes to the regs, even though they were pretty new to begin with. For example, the way they were previously written, even with over 15 years of experience building over $100 million worth of work, I couldn't get a light commercial license because I've been working in the preconstruction side of things for the past 5 years- under the old regs, I had to have completed two projects in the past four years in a direct supervision capacity with responsibility for the actual project completion. With the new regs, my bachelor's degree in CM and my experience (only 1 year required) would allow me to get licensed, which makes much more sense.