The license class, and why roofing is its own category
Florida licenses contractors by trade. Roofing is its own category, separate from general, building and residential contracting. Someone can hold a real, current contractor license and still not be licensed to roof your house.
There are two tiers within the trade. A certified roofing contractor holds a state license, prefixed CCC, and can work anywhere in Florida. A registered roofing contractor, prefixed RC, is licensed to work only in the specific local jurisdictions that registered them. Both are legitimate. The question is whether the one in front of you covers the work and the place.
Ask for the license number in writing, not a photo of a truck door. Then ask whether the number belongs to the company you are hiring or to someone the company is borrowing it from. A salesperson working under another firm's license is a relationship you want to understand before you sign, because the license holder is who the permit and the liability attach to.
How to verify it yourself on DBPR
The Department of Business and Professional Regulation publishes a public license search at myfloridalicense.com. You do not need permission or an account, and you do not have to take the contractor's word for any of it.
Search by license number if you have one, or by the company name. Check four things: that the license exists, that the status reads active rather than expired or null, that the category is roofing, and that the name on the license matches the name that will be on your contract. A mismatch between the licensed entity and the company writing the estimate is worth asking about before anything else.
The same record shows whether the license holder carries workers' compensation or holds an exemption, and whether there is any disciplinary history attached. Read it. It takes a couple of minutes and it is the cheapest due diligence available to you.
If a contractor is reluctant to give you a number to check, that is information in itself. There is no reason for a licensed roofer to withhold it.
A license number you have not checked is a claim, not a credential. The state publishes the record for free and it takes two minutes.
Insurance: two policies, and you want both
General liability covers damage the contractor causes to your property. Workers' compensation covers injury to the people on your roof. They are separate policies and they do different jobs.
Do not accept a certificate of insurance handed to you by the contractor as the end of it. Ask for the certificate to be sent directly from the insurance agent, with your name and address listed as the certificate holder. That is standard practice, costs nothing, and confirms the policy is current on the day the work starts rather than on the day the PDF was made.
Some roofing businesses carry a workers' compensation exemption for owners instead of a policy covering crew. That is lawful in Florida in defined circumstances, and it is also the thing to ask about plainly: who is covered if someone falls, and under what policy. Get the answer before the crew arrives, because afterwards it is a question for lawyers.
A written scope beats a verbal number every time
A price on its own tells you almost nothing. Two roofers can name similar figures for completely different work, and the gap shows up months later when the cheaper one turns out to have assumed a perfect deck.
A usable scope names the covering and the specific product, the underlayment product, the fastening, the flashing and boots being replaced rather than reused, how replacement decking is priced if rotten sheathing turns up, whether tear-off and disposal are included, who pulls the permit, what the warranty covers, and who carries it. The distinction between a manufacturer's material warranty and the contractor's workmanship warranty matters, because a material warranty does not cover bad installation.
Watch for the parts of an estimate that are deliberately open. Replacement decking is legitimately open, because nobody knows how many sheets are bad until the roof is stripped. The honest version says how that work is priced and leaves the quantity blank. The dishonest version says nothing and bills you later.
Florida law also limits how much of the contract price a roofer can collect up front before applying for the permits. Large money changing hands before any permit exists is a pattern worth questioning, whatever the reason given for it.
Permits, and the warning signs after a storm
The contractor pulls the permit, not you. If a roofer asks the homeowner to pull an owner-builder permit for work the roofer is performing, decline. That arrangement moves the code responsibility and the liability onto you, and it is usually a sign the contractor cannot pull one themselves.
Ask which jurisdiction the permit goes through and under whose license it will be pulled, and ask to be told when the inspections are scheduled. A roof that was never inspected is a problem that surfaces when you sell the house.
After a storm the pressure rises, and so does the number of people knocking. The signs to watch are consistent: an unsolicited door knock with a deal that expires today, a request to sign anything before an inspection, an offer to handle your insurance claim for you, an offer to cover or absorb your deductible, no local address, out-of-state plates with no local license, a demand for substantial money before any permit, and a refusal to put the scope in writing. Offering to pay or waive a homeowner's insurance deductible is prohibited in Florida, so a contractor who proposes it is telling you how they operate.
On the insurance side, be straight with yourself about what any roofer can promise. We document what we find with photographs and give you the condition in writing. We do not file claims for you, we do not perform or sign wind mitigation or four-point inspections, and we will not predict what your carrier will decide. That is between you and them.