How to send a Florida Notice to Owner: the §713.18 service rules, step by step

In short: serve the §713.06(2)(c) form on the owner and on the other parties your role requires, by a method §713.18(1) allows, and mail it by registered, Global Express Guaranteed or certified mail within 40 days of first furnishing so that service is effective on the date of mailing, keeping the mail log or the USPS tracking record. Can someone send it for you? Yes: NoticeSent builds the form from your answers, sends each piece by USPS Certified Mail with the tracking number recorded at submission, and keeps the record on a permanent archive page, for one flat $39. The steps below are the statute, section by section.

Step 1: confirm you are a lienor who must serve

Section 713.06 covers subcontractors, sub-subcontractors and material suppliers who are not in privity with the owner; laborers are excepted. If you contract directly with the owner you are not a §713.06 lienor. The definition page quotes the section. Whether you fit it on a given job is a legal question the statute answers, not this page.

Step 2: find the recipients and their addresses

The owner's address, the contractor's address and any designee come from the recorded Notice of Commencement. When there is none, the statute points to the permit:

A lienor, in the absence of a recorded notice of commencement, may rely on the information contained in the building permit application to serve the notice prescribed in paragraphs (a), (b), and (c).

Section 713.18(3)(a)1. describes the address that counts:

It is sent to the last address shown in the notice of commencement or any amendment thereto or, in the absence of a notice of commencement, to the last address shown in the building permit application, or to the last known address of the person to be served.

And when that address is incomplete:

If the address shown in the notice of commencement or any amendment thereto, or, in the absence of a notice of commencement, in the building permit application, is incomplete for purposes of mailing or delivery, the person serving the document may complete the address and properly format it according to United States Postal Service addressing standards using information obtained from the property appraiser or another public record without affecting the validity of service under this section.

Who gets an original and who gets a copy depends on your role; the who-receives page lays it out by role.

Step 3: prepare the form

Use the §713.06(2)(c) form with its warning and owner-protection block intact. The form page quotes it block by block.

Step 4: choose a method the statute allows

Section 713.18(1) permits three methods, and only three:

By hand delivery to the person to be served; if a partnership, to one of the partners; if a corporation, to an officer or director; if a limited liability company, to a member or manager; or to an employee or agent authorized by the partnership, corporation, or limited liability company to receive service of such document.

By common carrier delivery service or by registered, Global Express Guaranteed, or certified mail to the person to be served, with postage or shipping paid by the sender and with evidence of delivery, which may be in an electronic format.

By posting on the site of the improvement if service as provided by paragraph (a) or paragraph (b) cannot be accomplished.

Certified mail is the everyday choice because it produces the evidence the next two steps need, and because it unlocks the special rule for notices to owner.

Step 5: mail it within 40 days to make service effective on mailing

Subsection (2) gives the Notice to Owner a rule the general methods do not have. Service:

is effective as of the date of mailing and the requirements for service under this section have been satisfied if all of the following requirements have been met:

The notice is mailed by registered, Global Express Guaranteed, or certified mail, with postage prepaid, to the person to be served and addressed as prescribed in subsection (3).

The notice is mailed within 40 days after the date the lienor first furnishes labor, services, or materials.

Mail deposited by day 40 is served on the day it is mailed, whatever USPS does afterwards. Days 41 to 45 are still inside the §713.06 window, but service then depends on the general rules of subsection (1). That is why every NoticeSent date shows both numbers: day 45 as the outer limit and day 40 as the date to mail by.

Step 6: keep the mailing evidence

The third condition of the effective-on-mailing rule is a record. Either:

The person who served the notice maintains a mail log that shows the registered or certified mail number issued by the United States Postal Service, the name and address of the person served, and the date stamp of the United States Postal Service confirming the date of mailing; or

The person who served the notice maintains tracking records approved or generated by the United States Postal Service containing the postal tracking number and verification of the date of receipt by the United States Postal Service.

A certified article number, the recipient's name and address, and proof of the date USPS accepted the piece. Keep it for as long as the lien rights matter. NoticeSent captures the tracking number at submission and keeps the record on the archive page.

Step 7: serve the copies

The contractor's copy, the subcontractor's copy when the statute calls for one, the designee's copy, and a lender's notice all go by the same §713.18 methods. A lender's notice has one extra rule of its own:

A notice to an owner served on a lender must be in writing, must be served in accordance with s. 713.18, and shall be addressed to the persons designated, if any, and to the place and address designated in the notice of commencement.

Step 8: if the envelope comes back

Subsection (3)(a) treats a properly addressed document that is returned as served on the date of mailing when it:

It is returned as being "refused," "moved, not forwardable," or "unclaimed," or is otherwise not delivered or deliverable through no fault of the person serving the document.

The address has to have been the one subsection (3)(a)1. describes, which is why Step 2 matters. And one last rule covers properties with several owners:

A document served by a lienor on one owner or one partner of a partnership owning the real property is deemed served on all owners and partners.

How NoticeSent runs these steps

You supply the recipients and addresses (we mail what you verify); the wizard builds the §713.06(2)(c) form; each piece goes by USPS Certified Mail with the tracking number recorded the moment it is submitted; the document, the tracking and a timestamped log stay on a permanent archive page; and a returned piece triggers an email with a corrected resend offer. One flat $39 covers every recipient the statute names for your role.

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