Guide
Colorado roofing license: there is no state one, so check the city
Updated
This is the single biggest difference between Colorado and states like Arizona or Florida. There is no statewide roofing license to look up, so the verification you do is a local one.
No state roofing license exists
Colorado licenses several construction trades at state level through the Department of Regulatory Agencies' Division of Professions and Occupations, including electricians and plumbers. There is no equivalent state license for roofing contractors. Saying so plainly matters, because plenty of roofing marketing implies a state credential that does not exist. If a bid claims to be "state licensed" for roofing in Colorado, ask what license, issued by whom.
What Colorado regulates instead is the contract. Title 6, Article 22 of the Colorado Revised Statutes tells roofing contractors what they must put in writing, forbids them from touching your deductible, and gives you rescission rights. That is the state-level protection, and it is enforced through the contract rather than through a register. See Colorado roofing contract law.
So the check is municipal
Many Colorado municipalities license or register contractors for work inside city limits. Denver, for example, issues contractor licenses and certificates through Community Planning and Development and publishes a public tool to verify a contractor's license. Other cities and counties run their own schemes with their own classifications and their own rules, and unincorporated county areas differ again. Ask your own building department what applies at your address, and do not assume a license from one Front Range city is valid in the next.
The five-minute verification
- Ask the roofer which municipality licenses them and for the license or registration number there.
- Check that number with that city's building department or online lookup.
- Ask for the certificate of general liability insurance and workers' compensation coverage, and confirm the named insured matches the business on the contract.
- Confirm they will pull the permit for your address, and that the permit will be finaled by inspection before your final payment.
- Read the contract against the statutory list before you sign it: scope, dates, approximate cost, contact details, surety and liability insurer, rescission clause, deductible statement, and the bold trust statement about your payment.
A Colorado-based contractor with a local license, a local permit and a compliant contract is a materially different proposition from an out-of-state crew that arrived after the storm. The Division of Insurance's own storm advice says the same thing.