The Rule: Pay Within 45 Days of Being Paid, or as the Contract Provides

The obligation itself is brief. A licensed contractor must compensate a subcontractor or supplier for services, labor, or materials within 45 days after receiving payment for that work, or in accordance with the terms of the contract, unless there is a bona fide dispute regarding the amount due. A contractor who knowingly or willfully violates the statute is subject to disciplinary proceedings under Section 489.129 before the Construction Industry Licensing Board. Available sanctions include administrative fines of up to $10,000 per violation, restitution, investigative costs, probation, and suspension or revocation of the license. In practice, discipline follows the board’s penalty guidelines, and fines and restitution are the realistic outcome in most cases. License suspension or revocation sits at the far end of the scale, reserved for serious or repeated misconduct.

Why the Statute Is Narrower Than It Sounds

Three features limit its reach. The bona fide dispute exception removes most contested nonpayment from the statute entirely, and genuine disagreements over backcharges, defective work, or scope are the norm in payment fights, not the exception. The statute also treats payment in accordance with the contract as an independent path to compliance, so a contractor following its subcontract’s payment terms has little to fear from the 45-day clock. And discipline requires a knowing or willful violation, a standard well above late payment or an accounting mistake.

There is also context the commentary tends to omit. The licensing board has never been a collections forum, and payment-related misconduct was already disciplinable before this statute. Falsely certifying that subcontractors have been paid and misapplying construction funds have long been grounds for discipline. Section 489.1295 adds a standalone nonpayment ground, but it is an incremental step, not a new regime. For the ordinary payment dispute, where each side has a defensible position on what is owed and why, not much changes.

Where the Statute Will Actually Matter

The exception has edges worth noticing. It covers a bona fide dispute about the amount due, not every explanation for a late payment. Cash flow pressure is not a dispute about the amount due. A contractor who has been paid for a subcontractor’s work and holds that money to fund other obligations sits squarely within the statute’s target, and that scenario is more common than the no-basis nonpayment the law seems written for. A backcharge assembled only after a complaint arrives may also have trouble passing as bona fide.

The near-term effect will be felt as leverage rather than discipline. Expect demand letters that cite Section 489.1295 and complaints to the Department of Business and Professional Regulation filed to get a nonpaying contractor’s attention, because even a complaint that ultimately goes nowhere must be answered. For general contractors, the sensible response is documentation rather than concern. When money is withheld, the basis should be stated in writing at the time, tied to the amount due, and consistent with the subcontract. That contemporaneous record is what makes a dispute bona fide on paper and not just in hindsight.

Conclusion

Section 489.1295 is a modest change. It will not turn the licensing board into a payment referee, and contractors with ordinary, documented disputes face little new exposure. What it does is remove cover for the contractor who has been paid and simply sits on the money, and it gives subcontractors one more pressure point in collection efforts. Every situation turns on its contract and its facts, so it is worth speaking with an attorney about how the statute bears on your payment practices or an unpaid balance. If you are dealing with a payment dispute on a construction project, our attorneys can help you understand your options and protect your position.

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Florida Gives Commercial Landlords a Faster Path Than Residential Owners

Chapter 83, Part I of the Florida Statutes governs nonresidential tenancies, and it operates very differently from the residential side. Commercial relationships are defined mostly by the lease and a lean set of statutes, with few of the tenant protections that apply to apartments and houses. The statute does not even call it eviction. Under Section 83.20, a landlord brings an action for removal of a tenant, and that action proceeds under Florida’s summary procedure, which puts it on a fast track ahead of ordinary civil cases. For a multi-unit owner carrying a nonpaying tenant across a portfolio, that speed is the whole point.

The Notice Controls How Quickly You Can File

The clock starts with the right notice. When the default is unpaid rent, Section 83.20(2) lets the landlord proceed after serving a written demand for rent and waiting three business days, excluding weekends and legal holidays. When the default is a different lease violation, Section 83.20(3) generally requires fifteen days’ written notice to cure. If the lease sets a longer notice period than the statute, the lease controls, so the document in your file dictates the timeline. The demand must state the correct amount and describe the premises accurately. A sloppy or premature notice is the most common reason a removal case stalls, because a defective notice can force the landlord to start over and hands the tenant weeks of free occupancy.

The Rent-Deposit Rule is the Landlord’s Strongest Leverage

The provision that decides most commercial possession fights is Section 83.232. Once the landlord files for possession, a tenant who wants to defend the case must deposit the accrued rent into the court registry by the date its answer is due, and the court can order the tenant to keep depositing rent as it comes due during the litigation. Filing a counterclaim for money damages does not excuse that obligation. If the tenant fails to pay into the registry as ordered, the statute treats that failure as an absolute waiver of the tenant’s defenses, and the landlord becomes entitled to possession without a trial on the merits. This is why disciplined commercial landlords recover their space quickly. Most cases are resolved at the registry, not in a courtroom, because a tenant who cannot fund the rent usually cannot fund a defense either.

The Self-Help Lockout is the Mistake That Reverses the Advantage

The fastest way to lose a strong position is to take the law into your own hands. Florida does not give commercial landlords a clean right to change the locks on a tenant who is still in possession and disputing the default. Section 83.05 governs how an owner retakes possession, and a self-help lockout invites claims for wrongful eviction and for conversion of the tenant’s property, which can turn the landlord into the defendant. Accepting rent at the wrong moment is equally dangerous. Under Section 83.202, a landlord who accepts full payment of rent with knowledge of a default can waive the right to proceed on that default, so a well-meaning bookkeeper can undo an eviction the lawyers just filed. Consistency and documentation protect the case.

Conclusion

Florida’s commercial eviction process is efficient, but only when it is run with precision. The statute does the work. Improvisation is what costs owners months of lost rent and unexpected liability. Because the right notice, the registry strategy, and the timing of payment acceptance all turn on the specific lease and the specific default, these situations are worth reviewing with counsel before the first notice goes out. If you are dealing with a commercial tenant in default, our attorneys can help you move for possession quickly and avoid the missteps that give tenants leverage.

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The Exception That Section 768.79 Creates

Section 768.79 of the Florida Statutes lets either side in a civil action for damages serve a formal settlement offer, known as a proposal for settlement or an offer of judgment. The statute applies to both contract and tort claims, so it reaches the disputes businesses see most often, from breach of contract and unpaid invoices to construction payment fights and business torts. The concept is straightforward. One party serves a written offer to resolve the case for a specific dollar amount. If the other side rejects it and then does meaningfully worse at trial, the rejecting party can be ordered to pay the offering party’s attorney’s fees and costs from the date the offer was served.

How the 25 Percent Threshold Works

The statute sets a clear numerical trigger. If a defendant serves a proposal and the plaintiff recovers nothing, or recovers a judgment at least 25 percent below the offer, the defendant is entitled to fees and costs incurred from the date of the offer. If a plaintiff serves a proposal and then wins a judgment at least 25 percent above the offer, the plaintiff is entitled to fees and costs from that date. The offer stays open for 30 days before it is treated as rejected.

Consider a contractor sued for $200,000 who believes the claim is worth far less. Early in the case, the contractor serves a proposal for $60,000. The plaintiff rejects it and takes the matter to trial, where the jury awards $40,000. Because the award is more than 25 percent below the offer, the contractor can recover the attorney’s fees it spent from the date of that proposal forward. The plaintiff still collects the $40,000, but the fee award can erase much of it, and in a lopsided case it can exceed the judgment entirely. That is the leverage the statute creates, and it is why a well-timed proposal changes how the other side values the case.

Why Timing and Strict Compliance Decide Whether It Works

That power comes with exacting requirements, and courts enforce them strictly. A proposal must be in writing, state that it is made under section 768.79, name the party making it and the party receiving it, state its total amount, and address any claim for punitive damages. Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.442 adds further detail and requires the proposal to be clear enough that the recipient can evaluate it without guessing. A proposal that is ambiguous, omits a required term, or fails to resolve how it treats multiple parties can be struck down, leaving the offering party with no fee recovery at all.

Two further limits matter. A court can deny fees if it finds the proposal was not made in good faith, which discourages token offers designed only to manufacture a fee claim. And because the statute reaches actions for damages, it does not fit cases that seek only injunctions, declarations, or other non-monetary relief. Timing counts as well. Fees run only from the date the proposal is served, so a reasonable early offer protects far more of your costs than one made on the eve of trial.

Conclusion

A proposal for settlement is one of the most effective financial tools in Florida litigation, but it rewards precision. A proposal served too late, drafted carelessly, or priced without a clear read of the case can fail at the moment it matters most. Because the rules are technical and the consequences cut both ways, it is worth having counsel evaluate the timing and structure of any proposal before it goes out. If you are weighing a business dispute and want to understand how a proposal for settlement could shift the cost of the case, our attorneys can help you assess your position and use the tool to your advantage.

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Where the Lien Attaches, and When It Reaches the Building

A construction lien extends to the right, title, and interest of the party who contracted for the improvement. When a tenant hires the contractor, that interest is the leasehold. A leasehold can have real value, but in the situation where contractors actually need it, meaning a tenant who has run out of money and is on its way out of the space, it frequently has none.

The statute supplies an important exception. When an improvement is made by a lessee in accordance with an agreement between the lessee and the lessor, the lien extends also to the interest of the lessor. A lease that requires a build-out, sets a construction schedule, reserves plan approval rights, or provides a tenant improvement allowance is the kind of agreement that triggers this. The landlord never signed the construction contract, but the lease supplies the connection, and the lien can reach the land and the building.

How Landlords Cut That Off

Landlords are not without recourse, and contractors should expect sophisticated ones to have used it. The protection requires two things, and both must be in place.

First, the terms of the lease must expressly prohibit the landlord’s interest from being subject to liens for the tenant’s improvements. Second, notice of that prohibition must be recorded before the notice of commencement for the work. The statute offers two recording paths. The landlord may record the lease itself, or a short form or memorandum containing the specific prohibiting language. Alternatively, and more practically for a multi-tenant property, the landlord may record a single notice covering the parcel, stating the lessor’s name, the legal description, the specific prohibiting language contained in the leases, and a statement that all or a majority of the leases for premises on the parcel expressly prohibit such liability.

That second path is more durable than many landlords realize. The current statute provides that a compliant parcel-wide notice prohibits liens for a lessee’s improvements even if other leases on the parcel do not expressly prohibit liens, and even if the lien restriction provisions across the leases are not identical. A landlord holding a shopping center or an office building can record once and stop worrying about whether every lease in the portfolio matches.

What the notice cannot do is supply a prohibition to a lease that never contained one. The protection still depends on the terms of that particular tenant’s lease. A landlord who recorded a notice years ago and has a tenant operating under an older form with no prohibition in it has an unprotected tenancy sitting inside a protected parcel. Landlords managing this well are auditing lease files and bringing older tenancies onto current form at renewal or expansion, which is the moment the leverage exists.

The Demand That Tells You Where You Stand

Contractors and lienors furnishing labor, services, or materials for a tenant’s improvements have a tool here, and it is used less often than it should be. A contractor may serve written demand on the landlord for a copy of the lease provision prohibiting liability. The demand must identify the lessee and the premises being improved, and it must be in a document separate from the notice to owner. It must also include a warning in conspicuous type, in substantially the form the statute prescribes, advising that failure to serve the verified copy within thirty days or service of a false copy may result in the property becoming subject to a claim of lien.

A landlord who does not serve the verified copy within thirty days, or who serves a false or fraudulent copy, has an interest that becomes subject to the lien, provided the contractor has otherwise complied with the lien statute and did not already have actual notice that the landlord’s interest was protected. That last condition matters. A contractor who knows a prohibition is recorded does not improve its position by serving a demand and running out the clock.

The practical value of the demand is information, and the time to get it is early. A response confirming a properly recorded prohibition tells you your recovery runs to the leasehold and to the tenant’s credit, which is the moment to tighten payment terms, ask for a deposit or a personal guaranty, shorten the pay cycle, or slow the pace of work. Silence tells you something different. Either answer is worth having before you have a large receivable and a tenant who has stopped returning calls.

The Notice Tenants Forget to Give

When a lease prohibits the liability, the tenant is required to notify its contractor of that provision, and a knowing or willful failure to do so makes the construction contract voidable at the contractor’s option. Tenants routinely overlook this. A contractor who discovers after mobilizing that it has no recourse against the building has a decision to make, and the statute preserves the option to walk rather than finish work it priced on a different understanding of the risk.

Conclusion

Tenant improvement work is not the same credit risk as work performed for an owner, and the difference is decided by paperwork completed before any work commenced. Landlords protect the building through lease language and a recorded notice, and the parcel-wide notice makes that straightforward enough that contractors should assume a well-run property has one. Contractors protect themselves by finding out early rather than late, which means a title check for a recorded prohibition, a demand under the statute when the answer is not clear, and pricing and payment terms that reflect what the answer turns out to be. Because the analysis depends on the specific lease language, the recording history, and the timing of the notice of commencement, it is worth reviewing your position with counsel before the work starts rather than after a claim of lien is recorded. If you are pricing a tenant improvement project, evaluating your exposure on a build-out already underway, or managing lien risk across a leased property, our attorneys can help you understand your options and protect your position.

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One company, many compartments

Think of a Protected Series LLC as a parent company—sometimes called the “mothership”—that can create one or more “protected series” inside it. Each series can run its own business, own its own assets, take on its own debts, have its own members and managers, keep its own bank account, and even file its own tax return. Yet legally, there is only one company.

In the past, a business owner who wanted to keep three properties separate would often form three LLCs, involving three sets of filings, fees, and paperwork. A Protected Series LLC can accomplish much of that same separation within a single entity.

Two layers of protection

The structure offers two liability shields:

The first is familiar. Like any LLC, it protects owners personally from the company’s debts.

The second is what sets this entity apart. A horizontal shield separates each series from the others. If one series is sued or defaults on a loan, creditors generally cannot reach the assets of the other series or the parent company. A problem in your retail property, for example, stays contained to that series and does not put your other holdings at risk.

The catch: your records have to be airtight

That second shield is not automatic. It holds only if you keep clear, careful records that show which assets and liabilities belong to which series. The law sets a specific standard: your records must be detailed enough that a neutral outside reviewer could tell exactly what each series owns and how it got there. Sloppy bookkeeping can cause the walls between series to collapse, exposing everything the structure was meant to protect. Sound legal and accounting guidance here can make all the difference.

Is it right for you?

The Protected Series LLC can offer real efficiency and asset protection, but it is brand new in Florida, and some questions, such as how courts in other states or in bankruptcy will treat it, remain untested. Whether it fits your situation depends on your assets, your plans, and your appetite for a newer structure.

If you’re weighing how to hold multiple properties or businesses, we can help you decide whether a Protected Series LLC makes sense for you.

The post Florida Has a New Kind of LLC: Meet the Protected Series LLC appeared first on Ortega Group, PLLC.

A Timing Provision Is Not a Risk Transfer

A pay-when-paid clause is a timing mechanism. It sets the owner’s payment to the general contractor as the marker for when the subcontractor’s payment comes due, but the general contractor’s underlying obligation to pay remains intact. Florida courts treat these provisions as establishing a reasonable time for payment, and the duty to pay survives regardless of whether the owner ever pays. If the owner defaults, the general contractor is still on the hook for work the subcontractor performed.

A pay-if-paid clause does something different. It makes the owner’s payment a condition precedent to the general contractor’s obligation, which shifts the entire risk of owner nonpayment down the chain. Under a valid pay-if-paid provision, if the owner never funds the project, the subcontractor’s contractual right to payment never matures. These clauses are enforceable in Florida, but only when the language clearly and unambiguously establishes that condition precedent.

Why the Exact Wording Decides the Outcome

Florida courts do not infer a risk transfer from context or from the general commercial logic of the deal. The clause has to say so directly, using language such as “condition precedent,” “contingent upon,” or “expressly contingent,” and vague drafting is generally read as a pay-when-paid provision instead. Language stating that the subcontractor will be paid a set number of days after the contractor receives payment from the owner reads as clear on its face to most people in the industry, but courts have treated that phrasing as fixing a time for payment rather than eliminating the obligation.

The drafting burden falls on the party seeking the protection, which in practice is the general contractor. Even when the intended language appears, the rest of the contract can undermine it, because a conflicting provision elsewhere in the subcontract or in an incorporated document can be enough to support reading the clause as a timing provision. General contractors who copy a payment clause forward from an old form without checking it against the rest of their current documents often end up with less protection than they think they negotiated.

Lien and Bond Rights Do Not Disappear

A valid pay-if-paid clause governs the contractual relationship between the general contractor and the subcontractor. It does not automatically erase the subcontractor’s statutory remedies. Even where the clause is enforceable, it generally cannot prevent a subcontractor from pursuing a construction lien or a payment bond claim, with a narrow exception involving conditional payment bonds on private projects where both the bond and the subcontract contain the necessary provisions. Attempts to make a subcontractor waive lien rights in advance or to condition bond claims on the owner’s payment run into separate enforceability problems under Florida’s lien statute.

This is why the practical response to an aggressive payment clause is rarely to fight over the clause alone. Preserving the notice to owner deadline, the claim of lien deadline, and any bond claim deadline is equally or more important than the contract language. Subcontractors who let those deadlines lapse because they were told a check was coming lose the leverage that survives the contract.

Where the Negotiation Actually Happens

The realistic moment to address this is before signing. A subcontractor asked to accept a true pay-if-paid provision is being asked to underwrite the owner’s creditworthiness on a project it did not select the owner for and has no visibility into. That is a priceable risk, and it belongs in the number if it cannot be negotiated out. Common middle grounds include converting the provision to a timing clause, capping the delay after which payment becomes due regardless of owner funding, carving out nonpayment caused by the general contractor’s own conduct, or conditioning the clause on the general contractor diligently pursuing collection from the owner. On the other side, a general contractor relying on a payment clause it has never had reviewed may be carrying risk it believes it transferred years ago.

Conclusion

The label on the clause tells you very little. The operative words tell you everything, and by the time an owner defaults, the negotiating window has closed and the analysis becomes a fight over language written months earlier. Both sides benefit from knowing before the project starts which version of this clause they actually signed and what statutory remedies remain available if the money stops flowing. Because the answer depends on the precise wording, the rest of the contract documents, and the posture of the project, having the payment terms reviewed by counsel before execution is time well spent. If you are negotiating a subcontract, evaluating your exposure under an existing one, or facing nonpayment on a Florida project, our attorneys can help you understand your options and protect your position.

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What an LLC Actually Protects

A limited liability company creates a legal separation between the business and the people who own it. When the company incurs a debt, signs a contract, or faces a claim arising from its operations, the members are generally not personally responsible. A creditor of the business can pursue the assets held inside the company, but it cannot reach the owner’s home, personal accounts, or other property held outside the entity. That separation is the core benefit and the reason the LLC has become the default vehicle for operating a business in Florida.

The protection is real, but it is not absolute. It applies to liabilities the company creates in the ordinary course of business. It does not extend to personal guarantees an owner signs, to obligations the owner takes on individually, or to conduct that a court later decides was never truly separate from the owner in the first place. Understanding where the shield ends is as important as knowing where it begins.

Keeping the Liability Shield Intact

Forming the company is not enough. Courts can disregard the entity and hold owners personally liable through a doctrine known as piercing the corporate veil. This usually happens when the owner has treated the company as an extension of themselves rather than as a separate business. The most common mistake is commingling, meaning paying personal expenses from the company account or running business income through a personal account. When money moves back and forth without discipline, a creditor can argue the company was never a genuine entity at all.

Preserving the protection requires ongoing habits. The company should have its own bank account, its own records, and its own contracts signed in the company name. It should be adequately funded for the work it does rather than left with no meaningful capital. Significant decisions and transactions should be documented, and contracts, leases, and obligations should run to the company, not to the owner personally. None of this is complicated, but it has to be consistent. The owner who observes these formalities keeps the shield. The owner who ignores them may find the shield was never really there.

Inside Liability, Outside Liability, and Why Single-Member LLCs Are Vulnerable

There are two very different kinds of risk an owner needs to plan for. The first is inside liability, which is liability created by the business itself: a claim arising from its work, a defective product, an injury on a job site, or the conduct of an employee. For this type of risk, the LLC does exactly what it is designed to do. It contains the exposure inside the company and keeps it away from the owner’s personal assets.

The second is outside liability, which is liability that has nothing to do with the business. Suppose the owner causes a serious car accident and a judgment is entered against them personally. The question becomes whether that personal creditor can reach the valuable assets sitting inside the owner’s LLC. Here Florida law draws a sharp and often surprising distinction based on how many members own the company.

When an LLC has more than one member, a personal creditor of one member is generally limited to what is called a charging order. The creditor can receive only the distributions that would otherwise go to the debtor member. It cannot seize the company, force a sale of its assets, or take over management. When an LLC has only a single member, that protection largely disappears. Florida law allows a personal creditor of the sole member to foreclose on the entire ownership interest, step into the owner’s shoes, and take control of the company and everything in it. In practical terms, a single-member LLC does very little to shield its assets from the owner’s personal creditors. This is one of the most important and least understood points in Florida asset protection, and it is a frequent reason to consider a multi-member structure or a different arrangement altogether.

Anonymity and Florida’s Open Records

Structure is only half of the picture. The other half is privacy. Florida makes a great deal of ownership information available to the public at no cost. Anyone with an internet connection can search the state’s business records and identify the members or managers listed for an LLC. Property records are equally open, so the owner of a given parcel of real estate can usually be found in minutes.

This matters because asset protection begins long before a claim is ever filed. Plaintiffs and their attorneys routinely investigate what a potential defendant owns before deciding whether a lawsuit is worth pursuing. An owner whose name is visibly attached to several properties and companies presents an inviting target. An owner whose holdings are harder to trace is far less attractive. The goal is not to evade legitimate obligations. The goal is to avoid becoming an obvious and easy target, and to keep your own success from turning into someone else’s golden ticket. Structuring ownership to limit public exposure is a genuine and frequently overlooked part of protecting what you have built.

Conclusion

There is no single form to fill out and no one size fits all solution to asset protection. The right approach depends on what you own, how your businesses are organized, where your liability exposure comes from, and what you want to leave behind. For that reason, we do not hand clients a template. We sit down with them to understand their current structure, their assets, and their real exposure, and then we recommend an arrangement of companies, and where appropriate trusts, designed to protect what they have spent a lifetime building for themselves and their heirs. Because these decisions turn on individual circumstances, anyone serious about protecting significant assets should review their situation with an attorney before a problem arises. If you are thinking about how to protect your business and personal wealth, our attorneys can help you understand your options and build a structure that fits your situation.

The post Asset Protection Basics: What Your LLC Really Protects, and What It Does Not appeared first on Ortega Group, PLLC.

The Residential Exemption Is Narrower Than the Headline

The most discussed provision exempts work on single-family residential property valued at $7,500 or less from building permit requirements. That exemption is real, but it is limited in ways that matter. It does not apply to electrical, plumbing, structural, mechanical, or gas work, and it does not apply to property located in a flood hazard area. The practical effect is that the exemption covers cosmetic and non-structural improvements such as painting, flooring, cabinetry, and drywall finishing, not the trade work where most code and safety exposure lives. The law also prohibits dividing a larger project into smaller pieces to fall under the $7,500 threshold. A contractor who breaks a single scope of work into multiple invoices to avoid a permit is not complying with the exemption. The savings here are modest, and the liability for misreading the limits is not.

Faster Reviews and a Stronger Private Provider Path

The more consequential changes involve speed and who controls it. HB 803 amends section 553.791 of the Florida Statutes, which governs private providers who perform plan review and inspections in place of local building departments. The law now allows a fee owner or contractor to elect a private provider at any time, removing prior timing restrictions, and it eliminates the requirement that a private provider give the local building official advance notice of the date and time of an inspection. The bill also tightens statutory review windows, including a faster review category for certain smaller residential projects. For projects where schedule drives cost, the private provider route becomes a more reliable tool to keep work moving when a local department is backed up. That reliability comes with responsibility, because choosing a private provider shifts more of the review and inspection function onto the project team and the provider rather than the local government.

Commercial Fees, Uniform Applications, and Less Local Discretion

Owners and contractors on the commercial side gain ground as well. The law requires local governments to reduce commercial construction permit fees by set percentages and limits how building inspection fees may be calculated. It directs the development of uniform commercial and residential permit applications, which should reduce the friction of working across multiple jurisdictions. It also sets clearer permit expiration windows. Running through all of these provisions is a single theme. The Legislature has reduced the discretion local building departments hold over timelines, fees, and process. That is favorable for projects that are organized and ready to move, and it places more of the burden of getting things right on the applicant.

What to Revisit Before You Rely on the New Rules

A change in the permitting framework is a contract problem before it is a field problem. Contracts written under the old rules often assign permitting responsibility, allocate the risk of delay, and set notice procedures around assumptions that no longer hold. If your agreements assume a local department will perform review on a particular timeline, or are silent on private provider use and who pays for it, they are worth revisiting before your next project. The same applies to change order procedures and to how your team documents inspections when a private provider is involved. The contractors who update their templates and workflows now will quote and schedule more competitively. Those who do not may absorb costs and exposure they did not anticipate.

Conclusion

HB 803 is not a single exemption. It is a structural shift toward faster, more standardized, and more applicant-driven permitting across Florida. The contractors, developers, and owners who benefit will be the ones who understand the limits of the residential exemption, use the private provider path deliberately, and align their contracts with the new framework. Because the law touches contract risk, fee recovery, and project schedule all at once, reviewing your specific situation with counsel before you rely on it is a sound step. If you are evaluating how HB 803 affects your projects or your contracts, our attorneys can help you understand the changes and position your business to take advantage of them.

The post What Florida’s HB 803 Means for Contractors and Owners Starting July 1 appeared first on Ortega Group, PLLC.

What a Mechanics Lien Is and Why It Carries Weight

A mechanics lien is a legal claim against real property for unpaid labor, materials, or services furnished to improve that property. Under Chapter 713 of the Florida Statutes, contractors, subcontractors, sub-subcontractors, laborers, and certain material suppliers who furnish work or materials to a construction project have the right to lien the property if they are not paid.

The power of a lien comes from the fact that it attaches to the property itself, not just to the party who owes the money. If the property is sold, refinanced, or transferred, the lien must generally be resolved first. That gives a lienholder leverage that an ordinary breach of contract claim does not provide on its own.

For property owners and developers, this also means that failing to ensure payment flows properly down the chain — from owner to general contractor to subcontractors and suppliers — can result in the property being encumbered by claims from parties the owner may have never dealt with directly.

The Notice to Owner Requirement: A Deadline Most Parties Miss

Before a lien can be filed, most parties below the general contractor must take a preliminary step: serving a Notice to Owner. This is a written notice to the property owner, and in certain cases to the general contractor and construction lender, advising them that the party is furnishing labor, materials, or services to the project.

The Notice to Owner must be served no later than 45 days after the party first furnishes labor or materials. This deadline is absolute. Missing it does not create a procedural problem that can be corrected later. It eliminates lien rights for work performed before the notice was served.

General contractors with a direct contract with the owner are not required to serve a Notice to Owner. For subcontractors, sub-subcontractors, and suppliers, this preliminary notice is a non-negotiable prerequisite. Many parties lose lien rights not because of anything that went wrong on the project, but because they failed to serve this notice at the outset. It should be standard practice on every job, sent immediately after mobilization.

Filing the Claim of Lien: Deadlines and What Must Be Included

After completing work or furnishing final materials, a contractor or subcontractor who has not been paid must file a Claim of Lien with the clerk of court in the county where the property is located. The Claim of Lien must be filed within 90 days of the claimant’s last day of work or last delivery of materials to the project.

The 90-day window is not negotiable. Courts do not extend it for oversight, good-faith negotiations, or anything else. When the window closes, the right to lien is gone.

The Claim of Lien must include specific information: a description of the property, the name of the owner, the name of the party who hired the claimant, the amount due, and a description of the labor or materials furnished. After filing, the lien must be served on the property owner within 15 days.

Filing the lien is not the finish line. It opens an enforcement window. A recorded lien must be backed by a foreclosure lawsuit filed within one year of the recording date. Failing to bring that action within the deadline renders the lien unenforceable, regardless of how valid the underlying claim is.

Why Documentation Either Supports or Kills a Lien Claim

Lien rights are only as strong as the records behind them. Contractors and subcontractors who want to use the lien process effectively need to maintain clear documentation throughout the project, not at the end when a dispute surfaces.

That means keeping contemporaneous records of work performed, materials delivered, pay applications submitted, and payment communications. It means tracking Notice to Owner deadlines by project. It means knowing precisely when the last day of furnishing work occurred on a given job, because that date starts the 90-day clock. Contractors who treat this as a paperwork burden tend to find themselves without the records they need when a dispute arises. Those who treat it as a business standard have a meaningful advantage when payment problems emerge.

Conclusion

Florida’s mechanics lien law gives contractors, subcontractors, and suppliers a serious mechanism to recover unpaid amounts, but only if the procedural steps are followed correctly and on time. The deadlines are strict, the notice requirements are specific, and a missed step early in a project can eliminate rights that would otherwise be available. Building these practices into your project workflow before a dispute arises is far more effective than trying to reconstruct compliance after a project has gone sideways.

If you are dealing with nonpayment on a construction project, or you want to strengthen your payment protection practices going forward, our attorneys can help you understand your options and navigate the process. Given the time-sensitive nature of lien rights, speaking with an attorney as early as possible is strongly advisable.

The post Florida Mechanics Liens: How Contractors and Subcontractors Protect the Right to Get Paid appeared first on Ortega Group, PLLC.

Receiving a demand letter can be unsettling, especially for business owners unsure whether it is a serious legal threat or just a negotiation tactic. While Florida law generally does not require you to respond to a demand letter, ignoring one can still have real consequences.

Here’s what you should know before deciding to do nothing.

What Is a Demand Letter?

A demand letter is a written notice, often from an attorney, claiming that you or your business have committed a legal wrong, such as breaching a contract, failing to pay a debt, or engaging in improper conduct. The letter usually demands payment, corrective action, or a response by a deadline.

In many cases, a demand letter is sent as a precursor to a lawsuit.

Are You Required to Respond?

Most demand letters do not legally require a response. However, that does not mean silence is without risk. Demand letters are often used to:

• Establish notice of a claim
• Show an attempt to resolve the dispute before litigation
• Trigger contractual or statutory rights

Ignoring the letter can place you at a disadvantage if the dispute escalates.

What Happens If You Ignore It?

1. A Lawsuit May Follow
   A common result of ignoring a demand letter is that the sender proceeds directly to litigation. Silence is often interpreted as unwillingness to resolve the issue, leaving the other side little reason to negotiate further.
2. You Lose Early Settlement Leverage
   Resolving disputes early is typically faster and less expensive. Once a lawsuit is filed, legal costs increase and positions harden, making settlement more difficult and costly.
3. Attorney’s Fees Can Increase
   Some contracts and Florida statutes allow recovery of attorney’s fees. If a court finds that a demand was reasonable and ignored without justification, that conduct may be cited to support a fee claim or show lack of good faith.
4. Deadlines May Matter
   Some demand letters trigger contractual or statutory deadlines, such as cure periods or pre-suit notice requirements. Missing these deadlines can limit defenses or increase exposure.

When Ignoring a Demand Letter Might Be Appropriate
In limited circumstances, non-response may make sense, such as when a letter is clearly frivolous, sent in bad faith, or legally defective. In those situations, responding without a clear strategy can be worse than not responding at all, as an improper response may create admissions or unintended consequences.

Ignoring a demand letter in Florida may feel like the easiest option, but it often increases legal risk and cost. Even when a response is not required, understanding the potential consequences before a dispute escalates can significantly affect the outcome.

If your business has received a demand letter, having counsel evaluate it early can help you decide whether to respond, negotiate, or prepare for litigation on your own terms.

The post What Happens If You Ignore a Demand Letter in Florida? appeared first on Ortega Group, PLLC.