What Does the Word Licensed Building Professional Mean to You?

For over 20 years now I’ve been paying attention to advertising on television, newspapers and even in magazines. Nowadays we have to deal with the Internet advertisers who try to make something sound better than it actually is. Licensed building professional might mean something different to different people.

I was watching a video on YouTube the other day when the homeowner mentioned some problems that they had with an online contractor referral company. I can’t think of one online contractor referral company that doesn’t give anyone the impression that you’re going to be dealing with licensed building professionals and that might not be entirely true.

If I was going to write an honest ad for these people I would use the word licensed contractors if I was only going to allow licensed contractors on my referral directory. Let’s examine the word licensed. This would refer to anyone who has a license and nothing more. I’ve met plenty of licensed contractors who don’t know much about their profession. Make no mistake here, just because you have a contractor’s license, doesn’t mean that you have enough experience to complete a project that you’re licensed for.

Now let’s look at the word building, this would refer to anyone that has the ability to construct something. You can consider yourself a builder, if you built one thing in your entire lifetime. You’re probably not impressed about the words, licensed or builder, so let’s take a look at our last word professional.

A professional is anyone who gets paid for doing anything. You don’t need a college degree or any experience to consider yourself a professional. You can look all three of these words up in any dictionary, but when you break it down, it’s not as impressive as it actually sounds.

If you’re a licensed building professional, all it means is that you passed a contractors test, put at least one thing together in your lifetime and you’ve gotten paid for something that wasn’t a hobby.