Plain-English glossary · Permitting & process
Certificate of Occupancy (CO)
A Certificate of Occupancy is the jurisdiction's final sign-off that a building complies with the approved plans and code and is legal to occupy. It issues only after every required inspection passes and every open permit condition is closed — no CO, no move-in, no closing.
In plain English
The CO is where every loose end in the file comes home: an unclosed sub-permit, a missing final, an unrecorded document can each hold it. Lenders and title companies check for it, so a stalled CO stalls money, not just occupancy.
This is why we run permit tracking through closeout, not just to issuance — the job isn't done until the file is closed and the CO is in hand.
Why it matters on a Florida build
A finished house that can't close is pure carrying cost. The last five percent of the permit file protects one hundred percent of the payday.