Construction companies in Florida: 68,008 contractors by county and trade, the public companies and the rules that protect buyers

This report is for anyone working across Florida's construction market: owners and developers comparing contractors, firms looking for subcontractors or acquisitions, and B2B sellers planning a statewide territory. It gives the statewide and county counts, the public companies, the state rules that matter when you hire, and where to find names. For one metro at a time, see the reports on Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville.

Florida construction in numbers

US Census Bureau, County Business Patterns (CBP) 2023, construction sector (NAICS 23), State of Florida:

Florida's contractors are a little smaller than the national average of 9.4 employees, and they pay less: $64,124 against $76,580 across all states, which ranks Florida 46th for average construction pay (our calculation from the CBP state file).

That's 62,269 establishments with 1 to 19 employees (91.6%), 5,063 with 20 to 99 and 676 with 100 or more.

What CBP counts. Establishments are locations with paid employees, not companies: a builder with offices in Tampa and Sarasota counts twice. Self-employed contractors without payroll aren't included, and employment is a single pay period in March 2023, before the busy season in many trades.

Where Florida's contractors are

Miami-Dade has the most establishments, but Broward and Hillsborough have more construction jobs. Seminole County, outside Orlando, is the outlier for size: 1,705 establishments averaging 12.1 employees. The three South Florida counties together hold 26% of the state's establishments. County figures are from the CBP county file; 12 establishments are coded statewide with no county.

What they build

Roofing contractors average 13.6 employees, much larger than painters (4.0), which fits a state where roofs are replaced on insurance timetables. For-sale homebuilders are few but average 20 employees, and highway contractors average 45.

What's being permitted

The Census Bureau's Building Permits Survey estimates that Florida authorized 178,297 new housing units in 2025, up from 173,326 in 2024. The mix shifted: single-family units fell from 123,359 to 111,173, while units in buildings of five or more rose from 47,016 to 63,075. For trades, that means more of the work is coming through general contractors on multifamily jobs rather than directly from homebuilders.

Public construction companies headquartered in Florida

Headquarters and revenue are from each company's annual report or prospectus on SEC EDGAR, and the figures are company-wide, not Florida only. EDGAR also files GEO Group under a construction code, but its 10-K describes a secure-facilities operator, so it's left out; Limbach Holdings carries a Tampa address on EDGAR, but its latest 10-K gives Warrendale, Pennsylvania as its principal office. Large private contractors don't publish revenue and aren't ranked here.

Three Florida rules worth knowing before you hire

1. Almost every paid job needs a license. Florida exempts only work "of a casual, minor, or inconsequential nature" priced under $2,500 in total, and not when a larger job is split up to get under the limit. Look up any contractor in the DBPR license search; a certified contractor can work anywhere in the state, a registered contractor only in the jurisdictions where it met local competency requirements.
2. An unlicensed contractor can't enforce the contract. Under section 489.128, contracts entered into by an unlicensed contractor are "unenforceable in law or in equity by the unlicensed contractor." It protects the owner, not the contractor, and it doesn't excuse a surety on a bond.
3. Residential contracts must mention the recovery fund. Any residential repair, improvement or construction contract over $2,500 must include a notice that payment, up to a limited amount, may be available from the Florida Homeowners' Construction Recovery Fund if a licensed contractor breaks specified laws. A contract without it is a warning sign.

Owner-builders can work on their own home or a commercial building costing up to $75,000, but selling or leasing it within a year of completion is presumed to break the exemption.

Public work: FDOT and bonding

Contractors bidding Florida Department of Transportation road, bridge or transit contracts over $250,000 must be prequalified. FDOT sets each firm's approved work classes and a maximum capacity rating every year, and publishes a searchable list of prequalified contractors. Subcontractors, primes on jobs of $250,000 or less, and bidders on building or maintenance contracts don't need it. For other public projects, section 255.05 requires a payment and performance bond on state contracts over $100,000; counties and cities may waive it up to $200,000.

Prospecting Florida contractors

A statewide plan usually starts with three clusters (South Florida, Tampa Bay with Southwest Florida, and Orlando with the Space Coast), then Jacksonville and the Panhandle. Lead with what changed for the contractor: a new FDOT work class, a multifamily permit, a new county. Our guide to building a prospect list covers how to turn these sources into one list.

Illustrative example. The company and its assumptions are invented; the counts are from CBP 2023.

Gulfline Surety (gulfline.example) writes payment and performance bonds. Its targets are Florida's 5,063 construction establishments with 20 to 99 employees, the size where public and bonded private work starts to matter. If 35% bid jobs that need bonds, that's about 1,772 firms. Winning 5% in a year is 89 accounts; at an average of $40,000 in annual premium each, that's $3.56 million. The research that decides who to call first is which firms just gained FDOT prequalification or won a county contract. At that volume, research is the slow part; Bebop does it for each account in the list.

Statewide sources for names

Next step: go from the state to a single metro with the Miami construction companies report, or build the list with the construction companies industry guide.