Deposits and Progress Billing: How Florida Restoration Companies Get Paid

Some do and some do not, and a Florida restoration company deposit is not automatically a warning sign on its own. What matters is the size of the request, what it is attached to in writing, and whether it arrives before or after somebody has actually scoped the loss. A modest mobilization payment against a written emergency scope reads very differently from a large cash demand made at the door with nothing on paper.

On the emergency side, many companies in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach take nothing up front and invoice once the structure is dry. Others ask for a deposit covering the first mobilization: crew, truck, extraction, equipment set. On the rebuild side, staged payments are normal across the construction trade, because the contractor buys materials and books subcontractors first.

Florida law also attaches duties to the money you hand over at the start. The state statute on moneys received by contractors sets duties that attach to an initial payment of more than 10 percent of the contract price on residential repair or restoration work, which is how a mitigation-and-rebuild scope is normally treated. The contractor has to apply for any necessary permits within 30 days of taking the payment. It then has to start the work within 90 days after those permits are issued. The practical read for a homeowner is simple: a deposit is supposed to start a job, not park your money.

A work authorization is permission plus a promise. It gives the company the right to enter, open wet assemblies, remove unsalvageable material and place drying equipment, and it makes you responsible for paying for that work. It is usually not a price. On an emergency loss nobody knows the full quantity of wet drywall or the number of equipment days on night one, so the authorization sets the terms and the pricing basis while the scope fills in as the job runs.

That is the part worth slowing down on at the kitchen counter. An authorization that names the phase, the pricing basis and the cancellation terms is doing its job. An authorization that leaves the phase open, or that quietly reaches past mitigation into the rebuild, is committing you to something much larger than the drying equipment in your hallway.

There are four points on a typical South Florida water loss where money is discussed, and they are frequently confused with each other. Separating them is the single most useful thing a homeowner can do on night one. The table below is the sequence in plain order, with what each moment is actually for.

The authorization is a commitment without a total. The deposit, if there is one, is a payment against work not yet performed. The mitigation invoice is a bill for work already completed and documented. The reconstruction draws are a schedule you negotiate before the rebuild starts, not after.

Mitigation and reconstruction are two different jobs with two different billing logics, and treating them as one contract is where most payment confusion starts. Mitigation is emergency service work: extraction, controlled demolition of unsalvageable material, containment, antimicrobial application, air movers and dehumidifiers running until the structure meets a documented dry standard under the IICRC S500. It is billed after the work is done, usually as line items with quantities, because nobody can know the quantities in advance.

Reconstruction is construction. It has a defined scope, a fixed or allowance based price, permits where the work requires them, and a payment schedule tied to milestones. A rebuild in a Coral Gables house and one in a Brickell high rise price differently, because the building adds requirements: approved vendor lists, certificates of insurance, elevator reservations, restricted work hours.

The two invoices should also read differently. A mitigation invoice is a record of what happened, so it carries equipment days, moisture readings and dated photographs. A reconstruction invoice is a record of what was installed. For a line by line walk through of what belongs on the emergency bill, our sister site in the Restoration Doctor network covers how to read a mitigation invoice at https://restorationdoctors.com/blog/how-to-read-a-water-mitigation-invoice. The same structure applies to a South Florida job.

Signing a mitigation authorization does not obligate you to use the same company for the rebuild, unless the paper you signed says it does. Read for that clause specifically.

A claim changes when money arrives, not who owes it. You hired the contractor, so the contractor invoices you, and the carrier reimburses under your policy on its own schedule. Restoration Doctor works that way in South Florida: we bill you, the homeowner, and hand you a carrier-ready claim file with a line item scope, photo documentation and daily moisture logs.

The timing gap is the real problem. Emergency work happens in the first hours. The first claim payment usually lands weeks later, and it is normally actual cash value rather than the full replacement cost, with depreciation held back until the work is finished and invoiced. Your deductible comes out of that payment as well, and your policy's declarations page will state whether the hurricane deductible is a percentage of the dwelling limit or a flat amount.

Two more parties can sit between the check and the contractor. If you carry a mortgage, the lender is often named on the building portion of the payment and releases funds in stages after inspections. If you live in a condominium, the association master policy and your unit policy each settle on their own track, which can leave a unit owner paying an emergency invoice long before either policy pays out. Plan the sequence early rather than discovering it when the first invoice is due.

An assignment of benefits, usually shortened to AOB, is a document that transfers your post loss insurance benefits to the contractor, so the contractor pursues payment from the carrier directly and you step out of that transaction. For years this was routine on Florida property losses, and a payment structure that looked normal here five years ago is now a reason to stop and read.

Florida changed the rules. The assignment agreement statute, section 627.7152 of the Florida Statutes, sets out what an assignment agreement had to contain for policies issued from July 1, 2019 up to January 1, 2023. The required items include a written itemized cost estimate, a rescission right, delivery of the signed agreement to the insurer within three business days, and a bold face warning notice. The same statute then turns to newer policies. For residential and commercial property policies issued on or after January 1, 2023, a policyholder may not assign post loss benefits in whole or in part. An attempt to do so is void, invalid and unenforceable. A few narrow situations sit outside that rule, and a contractor taking assignment of your claim is not one of them.

This is a high level description, not legal advice, and the statute link is in the sources below so you can read the text yourself. The practical point for a homeowner in Miami or Hollywood is narrow and useful. If a contractor hands you a document at 2am that signs your claim benefits over to the company, ask what policy date it is written against. Ask why the company needs it at all. On a current policy that structure does not do what the contractor may think it does.

Most restoration companies working after a storm are legitimate operators doing hard work in bad conditions. The structures below are still worth questioning, because they shift risk onto the property owner in ways that are difficult to reverse once money has moved.

None of these is proof of anything by itself. Taken together, or presented with pressure and a pen at midnight, they are a reason to pause and call a second company.

A few clauses turn a routine emergency document into something much heavier. If you find one of these, that is the moment to ask for a plain explanation, and to ask for it before you sign rather than after the equipment is running.

You are tired, the floor is wet, and a crew is at your door ready to work. The goal is not to negotiate a construction contract in the dark. It is to answer a short list of questions in five minutes, so the work starts and the money stays clear.

Write the answers on the authorization itself if there is room. A note in the margin, initialed by both of you, is worth more later than anyone's memory of what was said in the hallway.

Everything above describes how the process works, and none of it is legal advice. The primary sources are public, and reading them before a pen reaches a kitchen counter is the cheapest protection a property owner has.