Masonry contractor in Lake Worth Beach - repairs that fix the cause

If the work builds, repairs or alters part of a building, the city's Building Division issues the permit for it, so a lot of masonry on a house falls under that. For work away from the house, like a freestanding wall or pavers, we ask the Building Division before we start. When a permit's needed, we pull it ourselves and set up the inspections.

Lake Worth Beach follows the Florida Building Code, with local amendments the city added for how permits and inspections run here. Work that doesn't need a permit still has to meet that code and the city's other laws, so we build a garden wall the same way whether or not an inspector comes to see it.

Yes, a business doing work at a Lake Worth Beach address needs both a city tax receipt and a Palm Beach County one. The county wants its receipt from anyone who sells services in the county, even a one-person outfit based outside it that regularly works here. A receipt doesn't regulate a contractor or vouch for the work, though, so ask what else they carry. We're licensed and insured.

They mostly matter on bigger jobs, because Palm Beach County's updated flood maps put thousands more homes in the eastern part of the county into high-risk zones and raised the flood elevation by a foot or more on many parcels. A house whose lowest floor now sits below that level can fall out of line with the rules when a large improvement goes in, so before we plan an addition or major wall work, we check where your house stands with the office issuing the permit.

It comes down to how much of the old work has to come out, what it takes to match it and whether the job needs a permit, so I give you a figure only after I've seen it. On older houses here, matching weathered brick and old mortar color takes extra time, and a tight side yard can mean carrying material in by hand. The biggest saving most people get is catching a repair while it's a few joints and not a whole wall.

Usually it's water getting into joints that have worn thin, a little settling underneath, or an earlier repair done with mortar harder than the brick around it. The mason who taught me drilled that last one into me, because hard mortar won't give, so the brick cracks instead. We find which one it is before we repoint, since new joints over an unfixed cause just crack again.