Choosing a builder is the single decision that determines how the next eighteen months of your life go. It sets the budget, the schedule, the quality, and how often you lie awake wondering what is happening on your lot.
Most owners compare builders on price. Price is the least reliable number in the room, because two builders can quote the same house and mean completely different things. Here is what to look at instead.
The Short Answer
Choose a Palm Beach County builder on three things: a verified license and insurance, an itemized line by line budget instead of a lump sum, and a portfolio of completed homes you can visit in the same market. Price alone is the least reliable way to compare bids, because two builders can quote the same house and mean completely different scopes.
The three things that matter most
Everything below narrows down to three. A verified license and current insurance. An itemized budget that shows every line instead of a single number. And completed homes in this market that you can go stand in front of.
If a builder cannot deliver all three, nothing else on the list matters.
The 12 questions to ask every builder
**1. Is your license active, and is it in the name of the company I am signing with?** Florida licenses are searchable and free to verify. The name on the license should match the entity on the contract exactly.
**2. Can I get a certificate of insurance directly from your agent?** General liability and workers compensation, sent from the agent rather than forwarded by the builder. This is table stakes and any real builder will send it without hesitation.
**3. Will the budget be itemized line by line?** This is the question that separates builders in Palm Beach County. A lump sum with four categories hides everything. An itemized budget lets you see the allowance for tile, the window package, the site work, and what happens if you change your mind in month six.
**4. What is in the allowances, and what happens when I exceed them?** Thin allowances are the most common way a bid is made to look competitive. Ask what the tile allowance is per square foot. Ask what the appliance allowance covers. Then compare that to what you actually want.
**5. What is explicitly excluded?** Landscaping, pool, driveway, dock, generator, audio visual, furniture. Every exclusion is a real cost that lands on you later.
**6. How many projects are you running right now, and who will be on my site every day?** Ask for the name of the person, not the title. Then ask how many other jobs that person is covering.
**7. Can I visit a completed home and an active job site?** An active site tells you more than a finished one. You see how the site is kept, how the trades work, and whether the schedule board is current.
**8. May I speak with three owners, including one whose project had a problem?** Every project has a problem. What you are testing is how the builder handled it.
**9. How do you handle change orders?** You want a written process with pricing before work proceeds. Verbal changes are how budgets quietly grow.
**10. What is your schedule, and what are the assumptions behind it?** A twelve month schedule that assumes a six week permit in a jurisdiction that runs sixteen is not a schedule.
**11. How will you communicate?** Weekly written updates, a shared photo record, and a named point of contact. Ask what the cadence is and hold them to it.
**12. What is your warranty, and what has it actually covered?** Ask for an example of a warranty claim they handled after closing.
The warning signs
- A bid that comes in far below the others with no explanation of why
- Pressure to sign before you have a full itemized budget
- No written contract, or a contract that arrives the day you are asked to sign
- A request for a large deposit before permits are even filed
- Reluctance to give you references or site addresses
- A license number that is hard to get, or that belongs to a different entity
What is specific to Palm Beach County
This market has conditions most builders outside South Florida never deal with. Coastal wind requirements, impact rated openings, elevation and flood standards near the water, and layered local design review in towns like Gulf Stream, Manalapan, and Palm Beach. Permitting timelines swing widely between Delray Beach, Boca Raton, and unincorporated county.
A builder who works here every week prices those realities into the original budget. A builder who does not will find them during construction, and you will pay for the discovery.
Ask directly: how many homes have you completed in this county in the last three years, and where are they? Our project map is one way to see what that looks like in practice.
The bottom line
Comparing bids right now?
Send us your plans and Chase comes back with an itemized estimate within one business day, so you have a real number to compare against.
Get an Itemized EstimateInterview three to five builders. Give them identical plans and scope. Compare itemized budgets rather than headline numbers. Verify licenses yourself. Visit an active job site. Then choose the team you would be comfortable talking to every week for a year and a half, because that is what you are actually signing up for.
If you are early in the process, start with a realistic budget. Our guide to what it costs to build a custom home in Palm Beach County lays out the ranges, and our custom home building services page explains how we run a project from design through closeout.
Ready to compare us against the other bids on your desk? Send us your plans and Chase will follow up with an itemized planning estimate within one business day.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many builders should I get bids from?
Three to five. That is enough to see the range in this market without the proposals blurring together. Give every builder the same plans and the same scope, or the numbers cannot be compared.
How do I verify a builder's license in Florida?
Search the contractor's name and license number on the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation license portal. Confirm the license is active, confirm the name on it matches the company you are signing with, and ask for a current certificate of insurance sent directly from the insurance agent.
Is the lowest bid ever the right choice?
Sometimes, but only when you have confirmed it covers the same scope as the others. A bid that comes in far under the rest is usually missing scope, carrying thin allowances, or assuming change orders will make up the difference later.
What is the difference between a fixed price and a cost plus contract?
Fixed price gives you one number for a defined scope, and the builder absorbs overruns inside that scope. Cost plus means you pay actual costs plus an agreed fee, which gives more transparency but less certainty. Both work when the budget is itemized. Neither works when it is not.
Should I hire the architect first or the builder first?
Bring a builder in during design, not after. A builder involved early can price the design as it develops, which prevents the common outcome of finishing a full set of drawings for a house that costs 40 percent more than the budget.
Planning a project in South Florida?
SouthShore Builders is based in Delray Beach and builds across Palm Beach County and Broward County.
Schedule a Consultation →|Call 561-517-0959
President, SouthShore Builders
Chase Lamson leads SouthShore Builders with decades of South Florida custom home experience. SouthShore is a licensed general contractor serving Palm Beach County and Broward County.
