ContractorLicenseCost.us
Daniel Mercer

Daniel Mercer

Licensing Research Editor, ContractorLicenseCost.us

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What he does here

Daniel Mercer edits this site. His job is the unglamorous part of contractor licensing: reading what the boards actually charge, and keeping these tables honest.

Every fee schedule on ContractorLicenseCost.us is read against the publishing board's own documents. That means the CSLB in California, TDLR and TSBPE in Texas, DBPR in Florida, the New York City Department of Buildings, the Arizona Registrar of Contractors, and the boards in Georgia, Ohio, North Carolina and Illinois.

When a board changes a fee, the page changes with it. Where a schedule has not passed that check yet, the page says so in plain words instead of dressing up an estimate.

What he checks, line by line

  • Fees. Application, examination and initial license charges, in the order a first-time applicant actually pays them.
  • Bonds and insurance. Bond amounts where a board requires one, and the liability insurance that replaces a bond where it does not.
  • Renewals and rules. Renewal costs, classification boundaries, and the thresholds that decide whether a job needs a license at all.

An honest limit

Daniel is a researcher and editor. He is not a licensing board, and this site is an independent directory, not a state agency. For a ruling on your own application, the board that issues your license is the final word. If a figure here and a figure on a board's website disagree, the board is right, and he wants to hear about it at contact@contractorlicensecost.us.

Guides by Daniel