The permit set comes before the ground

A new house in this county is usually a concrete-block building on a monolithic slab, with wood framing at the roof and at interior partitions. The sequence below is that house. It is not a pier-foundation house from another climate, and it is not a sales tour. The first step is a permit set the correct building department can review: site plan, floor plan, elevations, wall sections, structural information, energy compliance, and product information for windows and other listed components. Truss engineering often arrives as its own package. If a design professional must seal part of the set, that seal is part of the set. The contractor does not stamp it.

Nothing structural should be buried or built before that permit is issued. Clearing the lot is not the same thing as a building permit. The inspector and the builder have to be looking at the same pages. A plan drawn for another state is a sketch until it is revised for the Florida Building Code edition on that permit, including wind design for the site and the energy path that was chosen. The building permits guide is how you find the office. The building costs guide is why this sequence is not a price.

Termite treatment, vapor barrier, and the slab

Before concrete, the ground has to be ready to disappear. Fill is placed and compacted the way the plan and the soil require. A vapor retarder, the plastic sheet under the slab, is lapped, turned up at the edges, and sealed at penetrations so moisture from the ground has a harder path into the house. It is not a finish you can add later. Plumbing that runs under the slab is installed and tested while it can still be seen. Reinforcement, thickened edges, and any grade beams are the plan’s, not a habit.

Termite protection is part of the same moment. Florida requires protection for new construction. On a slab that is often a soil treatment, or another method the code and the product label allow, documented by the company that performed it. The certificate is for the inspector and the file, not for a closing gift. If the treatment and the vapor barrier are covered by concrete before they are accepted, the evidence is gone. The inspection before the pour exists for that reason. Its local name varies. The idea does not: the inspector needs to see what the concrete will hide.

Block walls

Concrete block goes up from that slab: units, mortar, steel and grout where the plan calls for filled cells, lintels over openings, and a bond beam or tie beam that ties the wall and anchors the roof. Straps or bolts are the load path, not trim. A wall inspection exists so steel can be seen before grout hides it. Openings are sized on the plan. Whether glazed openings need impact protection is a code determination for that permit, not a county nickname. The drawings say what the openings must do.

Roof dry-in

Roof framing, usually engineered trusses, is set and braced. Sheathing is nailed to the schedule. Underlayment goes on in the method the code requires, with drip edge and flashing started at walls and penetrations. Dry-in means the shell can shed rain. It does not mean the finished shingles or metal are on, and it does not mean the interior is ready for drywall. Afternoon storms will test a house left open. Windows often land in this stretch so openings can be closed. A unit set in block without a water path is a leak you will meet after the paint. Attic ventilation, if the design uses a vented attic, is decided here. The new home construction page describes this as a service, not as a diary of a house already built.

Rough trades, insulation, and drywall

Rough electrical, plumbing, and mechanical work happens while the walls and the attic are open. Wiring, the panel location, supply and waste above the slab, vents through the roof, and duct paths are installed to the plan. Underground plumbing already had its inspection. These rough inspections are the last easy chance to see the systems. Covering them to show progress produces openings later.

Insulation and energy compliance come after the rough inspections that must pass first. Materials and air sealing match the energy calculation on the permit, not a rule of thumb from another state. Some compliance paths include testing. This page will not say every house gets the same test. The permit says which path was chosen.

Drywall goes on after those approvals. Wet areas get the board the plan called for, which should have been decided before the tile was ordered. An attached garage, if the house has one, gets the separation the code requires between the garage and the living space. Drywall is not a layer you can use to hide a failed rough inspection.

Finishes and the final inspection

Finishes are cabinets, flooring, paint, trim, fixtures, and the exterior cladding, often stucco on block. Stucco is a system with a base, joints, and a weep condition, not a color. Interior finishes should not start while the roof still takes rain.

The final is a set of inspections, not a mood of being done. Building, electrical, plumbing, and mechanical finals look at the house as it will be used: egress, guards, smoke and carbon-monoxide alarms where required, fixtures, the panel, the equipment, and the site conditions the permit included. The jurisdiction then issues its certificate of occupancy or completion, using its own document name. Paint drying is not that document. A house without the final is not finished, even if a photograph would look finished.

The custom home builder page is about designing one house for one lot. Construction services is where framing, concrete, and drywall are described as work. This guide does not replace those pages and does not turn the sequence into a contract. It will not choose your plan or quote a duration. It will not say the company has built the house in any photograph. Those photographs are representative. Use the sequence to understand the next inspection.

• Permit set reviewed and permit issued before the shell is built
• Termite protection and vapor retarder documented before the slab hides them
• Slab poured only after underground plumbing and reinforcement can be seen
• Block, steel, lintels, and tie beam inspected while they are visible
• Roof dried in so storms are not an open-ceiling plan
• Rough trades inspected before insulation and drywall
• Energy work matched to the forms on the permit
• Finishes after the building is closed to weather
• Final inspections and the jurisdiction’s own completion document