Flooring in Florida after HB 735: what changed for the Brazilian contractor in 2026

For years, opening a flooring business in Broward or Miami-Dade required a confusing combination of authorizations: state license in some cases, county-level Certificate of Competency, municipal registration, GL, workers comp and sometimes more. Operating without these could result in stop-work orders and fines. Florida House Bill 735, approved in 2021 and fully in effect as of July 1, 2025, eliminated a significant part of that bureaucracy.

For the Brazilian contractor who always found the American process impossible to navigate, the change is good news. But there are important nuances — and operating on outdated information will cause problems. Let's go through it step by step.

The timeline of the change

What this means in practice for a flooring business

The bigger confusion comes from the fact that HB 735 doesn't create a new license. It eliminates the local requirement without creating an equivalent state one. Flooring was never a DBPR state category — and still isn't. The result is that flooring contractors in Florida today operate in a simpler regulatory space than before, but not an empty one. There are four critical points:

The new logic is: professional licensing is no longer the critical point, but insurance and business registration still are. And when work requires a permit (structural work, opening/closing walls, adjacent electrical changes), you still need a licensed general contractor to pull the permit — even if you're only installing the floor.

The $2,500 rule and the limit of work without a permit

Florida Statute 489.103 maintains a rule independent of HB 735: any construction work with a contract above $2,500 or requiring a building permit must be done by a state-licensed contractor. Work below that may be performed without a license, provided it is casual, minor and inconsequential — legal terms that allow wide interpretation, but limit what you can do.

For pure flooring — installation or refinishing without affecting structure or electrical — almost nothing requires a permit. Installing flooring on a prepared subfloor is not structural work. But when the project involves wall removal, electrical flow changes near the floor, or work in a new home not yet under certificate of occupancy, the permit is mandatory — and the GC signs for it, not the flooring installer.

What is still mandatory in 2026

Even without a professional license, the Brazilian flooring contractor in Florida needs to keep five items in order to operate legally and be hired by premium clients:

The numbers are estimates observed from brokers serving South Florida in 2026 and vary by company size, claims history, declared payroll band, and type of work (residential weighs less than commercial).

The hidden risk: asbestos in pre-1980 homes

There's a specific situation in which the lack of a professional license doesn't protect you, and the work can become a serious legal issue: removing vinyl or linoleum flooring in homes built before 1980. Those old floors and their adhesives often contain asbestos. Removing them without proper environmental certification exposes workers, owner, and contractor to civil and criminal liability.

The practical rule in South Florida — where there's a large stock of homes from the 1950s, 60s and 70s in neighborhoods like Wilton Manors, Lauderdale Manors, parts of Hollywood and older residential zones of Miami — is to require an asbestos survey before accepting a removal project. If present, refer to a licensed asbestos abatement contractor. Alternatively, encapsulating the old floor by installing new flooring over it is a common and accepted practice.

The opportunity few people are seeing

HB 735 is not just bureaucratic reduction — it's a competitive shift. Before, the Brazilian contractor without the structure to obtain a Broward Certificate of Competency operated in the shadows, relying on subcontract with a licensed firm. Now, he can structure his own company directly, with no professional licensing barrier.

Whoever understands this first has a double advantage: they can hire Brazilian labor in Deerfield Beach and Pompano with more flexibility, and can formalize operations to access B2B contracts with builders and designers — clients who require COI (Certificate of Insurance) and entity registration, but who historically weren't accessible to those without complete legal structure.

Minimum checklist to operate legally in 2026

1. Form an LLC with Sunbiz. Filing cost: $125. Annual fee: $138.75. Pair with an IRS EIN to open a business bank account.
2. Obtain BTR in each municipality of operation. In Broward, that means registering in Pompano, Deerfield, Fort Lauderdale, Coral Springs and so on. Each one separately.
3. Buy GL at minimum $1M/$2M. Look for a broker specialized in construction — a single trade flooring package is cheaper than a general contractor package.
4. Workers comp active from your first employee. Don't try to operate with 1099 to avoid workers comp — Florida enforces classification rigorously and the penalty for misclassification is severe.
5. Clear asbestos policy. For pre-1980 homes, always test first or encapsulate. Document the decision in the contract with the homeowner.
6. Written contract for every job above $1,000. Include scope, value, deadline, payment terms, rain/delay policy, and change order clause. Doesn't need to be long — needs to be signed.