Chapter 558 of the Florida Statutes: Notice, Response, and Suit

Before you can sue or arbitrate over a construction defect in Florida, Chapter 558 of the Florida Statutes requires you to go through a mandatory pre-suit process: serve a written notice of claim on the contractor, subcontractor, supplier, or design professional you believe is responsible, give them a chance to inspect the property, and then wait for their written response. Florida Chapter 558 construction defect claims run on strict deadlines, and skipping any step will stall your lawsuit once you file it.¹

Who Can Use Chapter 558 and What Counts as a Defect

You can bring a claim under Chapter 558 if you’re a property owner, a subsequent purchaser, or an association such as a condominium or homeowners’ association. Contractors, subcontractors, suppliers, and design professionals cannot use Chapter 558 to bring claims against each other.²

The statute defines a construction defect as a deficiency in the design, planning, surveying, supervision, construction, repair, alteration, or remodeling of real property that falls into one of four categories: use of defective materials or components, a building code violation that creates a legal cause of action, a design that failed to meet professional standards at the time it was approved, or construction that didn’t meet accepted trade standards for quality workmanship at the time it was built. The chapter covers both residential and commercial real property, including land with improvements, fixtures, manufactured housing, and mobile homes.²

The Two Deadlines That Control Everything

Florida imposes two overlapping deadlines on construction defect claims, and missing either one ends the case. The statute of limitations is four years. For most defects, that clock starts when the local authority issues a certificate of occupancy or certificate of completion. For latent defects — problems hidden inside walls or underground that weren’t visible at completion — the clock starts when you discover the defect or should have discovered it with reasonable diligence.³

The statute of repose is seven years. This is an absolute outer boundary. Regardless of when you discover a defect, you cannot file a construction defect action more than seven years after the certificate of occupancy or completion was issued.³

Here’s a detail that catches people off guard: serving a Chapter 558 notice of claim does not pause or extend the statute of repose. The repose clock keeps running through the entire pre-suit process.⁴ If your building is approaching year six or seven, every week spent on pre-suit negotiations is a week closer to losing your right to sue. Get an attorney involved early.

Preparing and Serving the Notice of Claim

The pre-suit process starts when you prepare and serve a formal written notice of claim that specifically references Chapter 558. The notice must describe each alleged defect in enough detail for the contractor to understand the problem, identify the location of each defect clearly enough that the contractor can find it without unreasonable effort, and include any known damage or loss based on at least a visual inspection. You are not required to perform destructive testing or hire an expert before sending the notice.¹

If the claim arose from work done under a contract, the notice goes to the person you contracted with. You must serve it at least 60 days before filing a lawsuit. If the claim involves an association representing more than 20 parcels, that waiting period extends to 120 days. The statute also says you should try to serve the notice within 15 days of discovering the defect. Missing that 15-day target won’t bar your claim, but acting quickly protects you from running into the statute of repose.⁴

Chapter 558 recognizes only three delivery methods for “service”:

Certified mail sent with a USPS record showing delivery or attempted delivery to the recipient’s last known address.
Hand delivery directly to the recipient.
Any courier service that provides written proof of delivery.

Using regular mail, email, or fax risks having your notice challenged as defective.²

What Happens After You Serve the Notice

Once the notice is served, the contractor gets a window to inspect the property. For standard claims, the inspection period is 30 days from service. For claims involving an association with more than 20 parcels, it’s 50 days. You must give the contractor and their agents or experts reasonable access to the property during normal business hours.¹

Destructive testing — opening walls, removing flooring, cutting into concrete — requires your written agreement. If the contractor wants to perform destructive testing, they must send you a written notice describing the testing, who will do it, the estimated damage, how long it will take, and who will pay to restore the tested areas afterward. You can object to the contractor’s chosen tester, and the contractor must then provide a list of three qualified alternatives for you to choose from. Testing must happen at a mutually agreed time, you can be present to observe, and it cannot make the property uninhabitable.⁴

There’s a real consequence to refusing destructive testing without good reason. If you block reasonable testing and a feasible repair could have been identified sooner, you lose the right to claim damages that earlier testing and repair would have prevented.⁴

Within 10 days of receiving the notice (30 days for association claims), the contractor may forward a copy to any subcontractor, supplier, or design professional they believe is responsible. This is optional, but contractors often do it to bring the responsible party into the process early.¹

How the Contractor Must Respond

The contractor must serve a written response within 45 days of service of the notice of claim (75 days for association claims involving more than 20 parcels). The response must take one of five forms:¹

A written offer to repair the defect at no cost to you, with a detailed description of the proposed repairs and a timeline for completing them.
A written offer to pay a monetary settlement, with a payment timeline. This offer cannot obligate the contractor’s insurer.
A combination offer mixing some repairs with some money, with descriptions and timelines for both.
A written denial disputing the claim and refusing to repair or settle.
A written statement that the contractor’s insurer will decide within 30 days whether to make a monetary payment. The contractor must notify the insurer at the same time they notify you. If the insurer fails to respond within 30 days, you are automatically cleared to file suit.

The insurer-determination option effectively adds up to 30 more days to the timeline. The contractor can also pair it with a combination repair-and-payment offer, contingent on you accepting whatever the insurer decides.¹

Accepting or Rejecting the Offer

If you receive a timely settlement offer, you have 45 days to accept or reject it in writing. Filing a lawsuit before formally accepting or rejecting the offer will get your case stayed until you comply with this step.⁵

If you accept a repair offer, you must give the contractor and their crew reasonable access during normal working hours to complete the work on the agreed timeline. The contractor gets some leeway for delays outside their control, including weather, permit issues, material delivery problems, or your own actions. If the contractor completes the repairs on time and as promised, you are barred from suing on the defects covered by that notice.⁵

If the contractor fails to make the agreed payment or doesn’t complete repairs within the agreed time and manner, you can proceed directly to a lawsuit without sending another notice. A broken promise during the cure period doesn’t force you to restart the Chapter 558 process from scratch.⁵

When You Can Finally File Suit

You can move forward with formal legal action once the pre-suit process is complete. That happens when the contractor denies your claim outright, when the contractor fails to respond within the 45-day or 75-day window, when you reject the contractor’s offer after properly serving written notice of rejection, or when the contractor’s insurer fails to respond within 30 days under the insurer-determination option.¹

The statute doesn’t force you to accept any offer. It only requires that you complete the notice-and-cure process before heading to court. If you skip the Chapter 558 requirements and file suit directly, a Florida court will stay your action until you comply.⁶

A court will only let your case go to trial on defects that were properly noticed under Chapter 558 and for which you completed the pre-suit requirements. Defects you never included in a notice, or defects where you skipped a step, won’t make it past the courthouse door.⁵

Adding New Defects as They Appear

Construction defects have a way of revealing themselves over time. You might send your initial notice about a leaking roof, then discover mold damage in the walls during the contractor’s inspection. Chapter 558 accounts for this. You can amend your original notice to add new defects as they become known. Each new defect still has to go through the full pre-suit process, since the contractor gets the right to inspect and respond to each one. You can include multiple defects in a single notice, and courts will also allow claims for defects that are reasonably related to or caused by defects you already noticed.⁵

Chapter 558 Deadlines at a Glance

The overlapping timelines are where most procedural mistakes happen. Standard claims versus association claims involving more than 20 parcels:

Serve notice before filing suit: 60 days (standard) or 120 days (association).
Contractor inspection window: 30 days (standard) or 50 days (association).
Forward notice to other responsible parties: 10 days (standard) or 30 days (association).
Contractor’s written response: 45 days (standard) or 75 days (association).
Your deadline to accept or reject an offer: 45 days after receiving it.
Insurer response under option five: 30 days after the contractor notifies the insurer.
Statute of limitations: 4 years from certificate of occupancy, or from discovery of a latent defect.
Statute of repose: 7 years from certificate of occupancy. Absolute deadline.

All of these deadlines run from the date of service, not the date the notice was mailed. And none of them pause the statute of repose, so the seven-year outer boundary keeps ticking throughout the entire Chapter 558 process.¹³

1
Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 558.004 – Notice and Opportunity to Repair
2
Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 558.002 – Definitions
3
Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 95.11 – Limitations Other Than for the Recovery of Real Property
4
Florida Senate. Florida Code 558.004 – Notice and Opportunity to Repair
5
The Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 558.004 – Notice and Opportunity to Repair
6
The Florida Bar. How to Comply with Chapter 558 Florida Statutes