Miami-Dade Recertification
North Miami Beach’s Building Department gives notice by certified mail; its Governmental Compliance Section takes in the report. One team delivers the complete recertification on North Miami Beach’s own forms.
- Engineer
- Juan Tercero, PE., M.Sc. · Florida PE 105256
Your city
How building recertification is handled in North Miami Beach
In North Miami Beach the recertification runs through the City of North Miami Beach Building Department. The department notifies the owner by certified mail, the completed report goes to its Governmental Compliance Section for review and approval, and the Building Official issues the approval letter. Below is what North Miami Beach’s recertification page, and the documents posted on it, say on each subject.
- The notice
- North Miami Beach’s owner-notification sheet says that when a building is due, the Building Department sends a notice to the owner or the owner’s representative by certified mail. The notice the city posts names a contact person, with a phone and an e-mail, for further information. Keep the letter: the same sheet counts the time to file from its receipt.
- Filing the report
- The city’s recertification page sends the completed report to the Governmental Compliance Section of the Building Department; one of the city’s sheets names the department’s Engineering Section instead. None of these pages says how the report is delivered: no portal, counter or e-mail is given for it. So we confirm it with North Miami Beach’s Building Department before the report goes in.
- The city’s forms
- North Miami Beach posts its own structural and electrical report forms, each under the Building Department’s heading. The guidelines North Miami Beach posts with them say the approved report forms provided must be used and that proprietary forms will not be accepted. The complete recertification we deliver goes on North Miami Beach’s forms.
- What goes with them
- The city’s owner-notification sheet says the report also includes an illumination survey for the parking areas, and that recertification reports bear an impressed seal and signature. North Miami Beach’s guidelines call for an infrared thermography inspection, with a written report, where the building’s electrical service reaches the size they set.
- After filing
- Once the reports are approved, the Building Official issues a Building Recertification approval letter, sent to the owner and to the professional of record; the city says to retain it as proof of approval. North Miami Beach’s guidelines add that reports may be audited, and the building inspected, at the Building Official’s discretion.
- Repairs
- North Miami Beach says the owner must hire a Florida-licensed contractor and obtain Building Department permits before any repair or modification. Once every permit has an approved final inspection, a signed and sealed report must state that the repairs are complete and the building is structurally and electrically safe for continued use; the time for the repairs is in the rows below.
- Extensions
- North Miami Beach’s pages describe no form or procedure for asking for more time. The guidelines the city posts say only that repairs being conducted under a permit afford additional time to comply with a complete recertification report. How that applies to a given building is a question for the North Miami Beach Building Department.
- If it is late
- The city’s sheets say a report not filed within the time limit brings a Building Violation, and that the Notice of Violation is posted on the building and mailed to the owner of record by certified mail. North Miami Beach’s Violation of Recertification Process sheet adds that if the owner does not respond, the violation is referred to the Unsafe Structure Board for a hearing.
Building office City of North Miami Beach Building Department 17050 NE 19th Avenue, 1st Floor North Miami Beach, FL 33162 Phone: (305) 948-2965
Read on the website of the City of North Miami Beach Building Department:
When it applies
The deadlines that apply in North Miami Beach
The schedule is Miami-Dade County’s, printed here for a building in North Miami Beach; the date on your own notice is the one that counts.
- First due in North Miami Beach: At 30 years — 25 for condominium and cooperative buildings of three or more stories within 3 miles of the coast.
- Then in North Miami Beach: Every 10 years, for the life of the structure.
- Time to file in North Miami Beach: 90 days from the Notice of Required Inspection.
- If repairs are needed in North Miami Beach: 150 days from the Notice to finish repairs that need no permit and to obtain permits for the rest.
- Condominiums & co-ops in North Miami Beach: The recertification serves as compliance with the state milestone inspection — no separate milestone report is filed.
Miami-Dade County’s rows, for North Miami Beach. Source: Code of Miami-Dade County, Section 8-11(f) · Last verified:
Questions & answers
Questions boards in North Miami Beach ask
Where do we file the recertification report in North Miami Beach?
North Miami Beach’s recertification page sends the completed report to the Governmental Compliance Section of its Building Department; the page does not say whether that is done online, by e-mail or at the counter. A city sheet names a contact, by e-mail or phone, to start the process. The department’s Important Notice page asks clients to sign into its Q-Less system to be seen in a timely manner — a general notice, not one about recertification.
Does our building in North Miami Beach have to be recertified?
The city’s recertification page covers all buildings except single-family residences, duplexes and minor structures, and it defines a minor building by a maximum occupant load and gross area. It treats condominium and cooperative buildings near the coastline, from a set height up, as a separate group with an earlier first recertification. North Miami Beach’s page gives ages for both groups; the ones in force are in the rows above.
What happens in North Miami Beach if the recertification report is late?
The city says a late report brings a Building Violation, with a Notice of Violation posted on the building and mailed to the owner of record by certified mail. Its Notice of Required Building Inspection goes further: a building not recertified within the time it gives after the Notice of Violation is declared unsafe and vacated at the owner’s expense. If your date has passed, send us the North Miami Beach notice all the same.
Is North Miami Beach’s recertification the same as the 40-year recertification?
Yes. The owner-notification sheet the city posts still calls the program by that former name. It is Miami-Dade County’s building recertification, run inside the city by the City of North Miami Beach Building Department; where a city sheet and the rows above differ on an age or a deadline, the rows above are the ones in force.
Do repairs for a North Miami Beach recertification need a permit?
The guidelines North Miami Beach posts say the initial report should be submitted as soon as it is complete and that repairs must not go ahead without permits; they also make legalizing an unpermitted addition a prerequisite to a successful recertification report. The permits come from the Building Department, whose Important Notice page says registered contractors can file permit applications of all types online.
One team
The complete recertification for a building in North Miami Beach
Next step
Send us the notice from the North Miami Beach Building Department — a phone photo is enough — or, with no notice yet, the address and the year built. We confirm what North Miami Beach is asking for and by when, and reply with a proposal for the complete recertification.
Next step
A county notice in your hand, a building that worries you or a new project — describe it and attach what you have. A phone photo of the letter is enough. You hear back from the engineer, with questions or with a written proposal.
The proposal is free. We usually reply within two hours.