Maryland · Landscaping licensing · official-source guide
The Maryland Home Improvement Commission licenses landscaping as home improvement work on residential property, so a landscape contractor needs an MHIC contractor license statewide. Expect two years of trade experience, a passing exam score, and general liability insurance of at least $500,000. Separate state licenses cover pesticide application, turf fertilizer, tree work and the landscape architect title.
Verified against agency sources on 2026-10-12. Rules and fees change; confirm with the named authority before relying on this guide.
Landscaping is licensed at state level in Maryland, not county by county. The Maryland Home Improvement Commission, inside the Maryland Department of Labor's Division of Occupational and Professional Licensing, issues the contractor license a residential landscaping business has to hold. The Commission states on its own licensing FAQ that landscape contractors are licensed by MHIC. Home improvement, as the Commission defines it, means alteration, remodeling, repair or replacement of a building or part of a building used as a residence, and its published work list reaches improvements to land next to the residence. One license covers the whole state. A patio in Towson and a grading job in Frederick run off the same number. No county issues a competing landscaping license, although counties and towns still issue the grading, sediment control and right of way permits the work needs. The Commission does more than hand out numbers. It investigates homeowner complaints, awards money damages against licensed contractors, and prosecutes people who take landscaping money without a license. It also runs a Guaranty Fund paid for by licensees that reimburses homeowners for losses on work by licensed contractors. Commission offices are at 100 S. Charles Street, Tower I, Baltimore, and walk in service is not offered. Everything routine, including renewal, runs through the Department of Labor online licensing system.
Sourceslabor.maryland.gov 1labor.maryland.gov 2labor.maryland.gov 3
The Commission publishes a list of work that usually needs its license, and Landscaping sits on it. So do sod when it goes in as landscaping, grading, excavating, driveways including gravel driveways, paving, patios, flagstone, sidewalks, fences, railings, bricklaying, masonry pointing and retaining walls. The licensing FAQ answers the hardscape question in plain words: installing paver patios and retaining walls at a residence is home improvement, because the definition reaches an improvement to land adjacent to the residence. Permanently installed sheds, pole buildings and play structures attached to the land are also in. Some neighboring work is out. Demolition and clean up on their own are not home improvement. A prefab shed set on the ground or on cinder blocks is not, if the contractor only delivers and places it. New home construction is not covered by this license, and builders register with the Home Builder Registration Unit at the Office of the Attorney General instead. Marine contracting, including shore erosion control and piers in tidal wetlands, now sits with the Maryland Department of the Environment under a separate license. Commercial grounds work falls outside the home improvement law, as does work on commonly owned areas of condominiums and on buildings holding four or more single family units. Read the list before you bid, because the dividing line is the residence and the land beside it.
Business Regulation section 8-301 says a person must have a contractor license whenever the person acts as a contractor in the State, and must have a salesperson or contractor license whenever the person sells a home improvement in the State. For a landscaping outfit that means the business entity carries the contractor license and anyone selling the work carries a salesperson license unless they are covered by the contractor license. The statute lists the exemptions. An individual who works for a contractor for a salary or wages, and who is not a salesperson, needs nothing of their own. Clerical staff and retail clerks of a licensed contractor are out for transactions on the licensee's premises. A solicitor who only telephones owners is out. An architect, electrician, plumber or heating and air conditioning contractor who already has to meet State or local competency standards, currently holds that license, and acts only inside that scope, does not also need an MHIC license for that work. Licensed security systems technicians and licensed marine contractors are exempt, and so is anyone selling home improvement work that one of those exempt people will perform. The practical reading for a crew leader is simple. Your laborers do not need cards. The company needs the license, and the person who signs the homeowner needs to be licensed.
COMAR 09.08.01.23 sets the entry bar. An applicant for a home improvement contractor license shall have at least two years of trade experience. The regulation spells out what counts, which matters because grounds work rarely comes with tidy pay stubs. Participation in a registered apprenticeship program counts. Employment performing home improvements counts. Employment performing commercial or residential construction, repairs or renovations counts, so commercial grounds and sitework time is usable. Participation in a community service or charitable building or renovation program counts. So does performing repairs and improvements that required a building permit on your own home or a family member's home. Two years as a licensed home improvement salesperson can be credited as trade experience if the Commission decides you gained substantial knowledge of running a home improvement business. There are substitutions. Experience as a supervisor, manager or owner of a business may replace one year of the trade experience after Commission review. Vocational school training in a building trade, or participation in a building trade work study program, may be substituted for the trade experience outright. Applicants with documented handicaps have their experience and education reviewed case by case. Collect verification letters from the people you worked for before you apply, because the Commission reviews the documentation rather than taking the claim at face value.
Sourcesregs.maryland.gov
You pass the exam before you apply. Business Regulation section 8-302 requires an applicant to pass the examination prior to submitting a license application, and it requires the Commission to schedule an applicant for an examination within forty five days after the request. PSI administers the test for the Commission. The contractor examination is fifty five questions and the salesperson examination is thirty five. Both are built on the laws and regulations covering the operation of a home improvement business and the sale of home improvement work, not on turf, plant material or paver base depth. You must score at least seventy percent. The exam is delivered by computer, lasts two hours, and the standard fee is sixty three dollars paid to PSI. Testing centers are in Baltimore, College Park, Salisbury, Frederick, Hagerstown, Lanham and Crofton, by appointment only, Monday through Friday. If you fail you wait thirty days before reapplying, and any further attempt waits sixty days, with the fee due each time. A passing score expires after two years, so apply for licensure inside that window or sit the exam again. No prep course is required. Many community colleges offer one, and Montgomery College offers an exam prep course in Spanish. The Commission sells a study guide through PSI covering business, law and project management.
The fee schedule sits in COMAR 09.08.07.02 and changed on August 1, 2024. A contractor license application costs two hundred eighty one dollars and twenty five cents for each place of business, plus a twenty two dollar and fifty cent application processing fee. A salesperson license application is one hundred twelve dollars and fifty cents. Renewal matches application for both: $281.25 per place of business for a contractor and $112.50 for a salesperson. Inactive status costs $56.25 to apply for, then $126.75 per renewal for a contractor and $42.25 for a salesperson, with an $11.25 reissuance fee to reactivate. A certification of license status is $1.25 and document copies are $1.25 per page. The examination fee goes to the testing service, not to the Commission. On top of the license fee comes the Guaranty Fund assessment, which is what makes a Maryland license worth something to a homeowner. The two year assessment is one hundred dollars for an original contractor license and one hundred seventy five dollars on each renewal, payable before the Commission will renew. The Fund pays homeowners for actual losses from poor workmanship or failure to perform, but only for work by licensed contractors. The ceiling for one homeowner is the amount paid to the contractor, up to thirty thousand dollars, and claims above two hundred fifty thousand dollars against one contractor are prorated. The license itself runs two years. COMAR 09.08.01.18 presumes an application received within two years of expiration to be a renewal, and one received later to be an application for a new license, which sends you back to the exam. A renewal is not backdated. It takes effect when you finish the Commission's requirements and expires two years from the old expiration date, so a late renewal buys less than a full term. There is no continuing education requirement attached to this license.
Sourcesregs.maryland.gov 1labor.maryland.gov 2regs.maryland.gov 3
Maryland screens your balance sheet, which surprises contractors moving in from states that only check a test score. COMAR 09.08.01.19 requires an applicant for an original contractor license to file a credit report from an approved credit reporting agency plus a statement of all outstanding judgments and pending civil actions. The Commission weighs that against the financial solvency standard in Business Regulation section 8-311. An applicant who cannot show a net worth equal to the maximum Fund award available to one claimant must obtain a two year surety bond for that amount, and must keep a bond in force until the Commission agrees net worth is sufficient and authorizes cancellation. The application page publishes surety bond forms in two amounts, thirty thousand dollars and one hundred thousand dollars, and an indemnitor form for applicants who use a backer instead. Holding a bond does not stop the Commission denying or revoking on solvency grounds, and the Commission can demand proof of solvency at any time. Insurance is now a flat statutory floor. Business Regulation section 8-302.1 requires an applicant for a contractor license to maintain general liability insurance of at least five hundred thousand dollars, and requires a licensed contractor to maintain the same. That took effect June 1, 2024, so older policies written to a lower limit need raising. Carry the certificate, because homeowners on larger tree and hardscape jobs ask for it.
Sourcesregs.maryland.gov 1labor.maryland.gov 2mgaleg.maryland.gov 3labor.maryland.gov 4
Design work has its own board. The Maryland Board of Examiners of Landscape Architects licenses individuals and issues permits to the partnerships and corporations through which landscape architecture is practiced, under Business Occupations and Professions Article Title 9 and COMAR 09.28. Section 9-301 requires a license before an individual may practice landscape architecture in the State, and section 9-601 adds that a person may not practice, attempt to practice, or offer to practice landscape architecture unless licensed. The statutory definition catches work a design build landscaper sells every week, including master plans and site plans, construction documents, construction observation and project management, and design and analysis of grading and drainage, irrigation, and erosion and sediment control systems. Exemptions cover federal employees, and anyone working under the supervision of a licensed landscape architect or employed by an authorized practice who does not take responsible charge of design or supervision. Fees are modest. An original license is eighty six dollars plus a thirty nine dollar application fee for a two year term, renewal is eighty six dollars, a reciprocal license is one hundred twenty six dollars, and a firm permit is one hundred fifty one dollars originally and one hundred twelve dollars to renew. The examination is CLARB's. Senate Bill 256 and House Bill 485, signed April 28, 2026, rename the board the State Board of Landscape Architects and rename licensees Professional Landscape Architects. Renewal carries real homework. COMAR 09.28.04.03 requires twenty four professional development hours in each two year cycle, at least sixteen of them standard activities and no more than eight alternative, with eight of the standard hours focused on health, safety and welfare, and all of them approved by LACES or the Board. Arriving from another state runs through a waiver rather than a reciprocity list. Section 9-306 lets the Board waive requirements for an applicant licensed elsewhere only on proof of substantially equivalent examination and qualifications, and only if that state waives to a similar extent for Maryland licensees.
Sourceslabor.maryland.gov 1labor.maryland.gov 2mgaleg.maryland.gov 3mgaleg.maryland.gov 4mgaleg.maryland.gov 5mgaleg.maryland.gov 6regs.maryland.gov 7
This is the rule most landscapers in Maryland get wrong. The Maryland Department of Agriculture's Pesticide Regulation Section says a pesticide business is any business offering pest control services or applying general or restricted use pesticides for hire as part of a service or contract, and it names the examples: lawn care companies using weed and feed or organic pesticides, and landscapers using Roundup or animal repellents. A pesticide business license is required to provide those services. There is no small job exemption and no organic exemption. To get the license the firm applies to MDA, designates at least one person certified as a pest control applicator in each category it works in, pays a one hundred fifty dollar annual business license fee, and files proof of general liability insurance of one hundred thousand dollars per person and three hundred thousand dollars per occurrence for bodily injury, plus fifteen thousand dollars per occurrence and thirty thousand dollars annual aggregate for property damage. The original certificate of insurance stays on file with MDA, listing MDA Pesticide Regulations in Annapolis as a certificate holder, so a cancelled policy reaches the enforcement section directly. The license year runs July 1 through June 30. Category 3 is Ornamentals and Turf, which is the one most grounds work falls under, and MDA publishes the manual for it.
Sourcesmda.maryland.gov 1mda.maryland.gov 2mda.maryland.gov 3
The business license is only valid with a certified applicator attached. To be certified as a pest control applicator you must be at least eighteen and have at least one year of practical pesticide application experience as a registered employee in the categories you want. A degree in a biological field such as biology, botany, horticulture, entomology or agronomy can stand in for the experience, and so can certain MDA approved courses. Applications go in at least one month before the examination with verification of experience forms or transcripts attached. Examinations are multiple choice and closed book, offered every other month in Annapolis, Salisbury and Frederick. You pass the Core examination plus at least one category examination with seventy percent or better, and Core is not itself a category. Retakes cost ten dollars each. The certification fee is seventy five dollars a year for the first category and twenty five dollars for each additional main category. Certificates last one year and recertification training is annual, with Category 3 applicators needing eight credits a year, where one credit equals half an hour of training. Miss the training and you retake the examinations by June 30. Nonresidents already certified in their home state can certify here through a one time reciprocity process. Maryland residents cannot, and must sit the examinations. Below the certificate sits the registered employee rule. Every employee involved in pest control sales, service or inspections must finish MDA approved training on pesticide laws, label comprehension, safety and emergency procedures, pest identification, application techniques, environmental and health concerns and integrated pest management within thirty days of hire or of a change in duties. Until then they may not apply pesticides unless a certified applicator or registered employee is physically present. Registration costs thirty dollars per new employee and thirty dollars a year after that, runs July 1 through June 30, and produces an identification card the employee must carry and show on request.
Sourcesmda.maryland.gov
Maryland's lawn fertilizer law, in force since October 1, 2013, sits with the Maryland Department of Agriculture and is separate from the pesticide program. Lawn care professionals hired to apply fertilizer to lawns must be certified by the department or work under the direct supervision of someone who is. The same applies to anyone responsible for turf management at golf courses, public parks, airports, athletic fields, businesses and cemeteries. Individuals and businesses that fertilize turf also need a business license. The Professional Fertilizer Applicator certification fee is one hundred dollars and the fertilizer business license is fifty dollars, both expiring December 31 each year. Certificates renew yearly for one hundred dollars with verification of recertification training, and MDA now runs weekly recertification webinars. License holders file an annual fertilizer application report covering the previous year by March 1. The application rules travel with the certificate. A single application may not exceed 0.9 pound of total nitrogen per thousand square feet, of which no more than 0.7 pound may be soluble nitrogen. Phosphorus goes down only when a soil test calls for it or when a lawn is being established, patched or renovated. Keep fertilizer ten to fifteen feet from waterways, and do not apply lawn fertilizer between November 16 and March 1. Violators face civil penalties up to one thousand dollars for a first violation and two thousand dollars after that.
Sourcesmda.maryland.gov 1mda.maryland.gov 2mda.maryland.gov 3
Trees are carved out of the MHIC license entirely. The Commission's own FAQ says that while landscape contractors are licensed by MHIC, the Maryland Department of Natural Resources licenses tree experts, and it defines that work as trimming, pruning, thinning, cabling, shaping, removing or reducing the crown of trees twenty feet or more in height. The DNR Forest Service states flatly that a person may not engage in the work or business of a tree expert without a department license. An employee working under the supervision of a Licensed Tree Expert does not need their own license, but the licensee must notify the department electronically of every company operating under the license, any change in that status, and the liability, property damage and workers compensation insurance those companies carry. Qualifying runs two ways. Either two years of approved college education in forestry, arboriculture, horticulture or applied agricultural sciences plus one year of experience with a licensed tree expert, or at least three continuous years immediately before application practicing as a tree expert with a licensed tree expert. Applicants must be eighteen, pass the department exam, and carry proof of liability and property damage insurance for the life of the license. Natural Resources section 5-419 caps the fees: forty five dollars for the examination, fifty five dollars for the initial license and one hundred dollars for renewal, with a professional development curriculum required to renew.
Sourceslabor.maryland.gov 1dnr.maryland.gov 2mgaleg.maryland.gov 3
Maryland has no standalone irrigation contractor license, so the question is where the plumbing law starts. Business Occupations and Professions section 12-101 defines providing plumbing services as installing, maintaining, extending, altering or removing piping, fixtures, appliances, appurtenances or other plumbing apparatus within or adjacent to a building, structure or property in connection with a public or private water supply system, a disposal or drainage system, or a venting system. The definition then carves out the sprinkler side with one important exception: except for the first connection to a potable water supply downstream of a backflow preventer, and the final connection discharging into a disposal or drainage facility, providing plumbing services does not reach that piping. Read it the way the Board does. Lateral pipe, heads, valves and controllers are irrigation work. The tie in to the potable supply at the backflow device is plumbing, and the statute lists backflow preventers among the operational devices covered. The State Board of Plumbing licenses the people who provide plumbing and gas services, and its licenses are required statewide except in Baltimore County and the area served by the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission, meaning Prince George's and Montgomery counties. In those three jurisdictions the local authority licenses plumbers instead, so a company working across the Baltimore and Washington suburbs needs to check each one rather than assume the state card travels.
State licensing is only half the picture in the Washington suburbs. Montgomery County's pesticide law, administered by its Department of Environmental Protection, is written to inform the public about pesticide applications and to minimize pesticide use for cosmetic purposes, while leaving agriculture, public health uses and other public benefit uses alone. For a lawn and grounds contractor that means the product list, not the license, is the binding constraint on county lawns, playgrounds and other specified areas. The county's own guidance gives the field test: if a product has an EPA registration number it is generally not allowed on those areas, and products carrying an OMRI logo generally are. The county publishes a list of lawn care pesticides compatible with organic use, drawn from products registered by the State Chemist for use in Maryland, and notes the list may not be complete. Weed control products with the active ingredient iron HEDTA appear on it. The law does not ban retail sale, so a product sitting on a shelf in Rockville is not evidence you may apply it. Applications to control biting or stinging insects and disease vectors, including mosquito work, are allowed when the applicator is properly licensed and follows label directions. Bid Montgomery County lawn programs on the approved product list, and say so in the proposal, because homeowners there ask.
Maryland tells you exactly what to put on the truck. COMAR 09.08.01.06 requires licensed contractors and subcontractors to conspicuously display their home improvement license number, preceded by the designation MHIC #, on both sides of every vehicle primarily used by the licensee, or under the licensee's direction and control, for performing home improvement work. Hauling material to and from the jobsite counts as performing the work. Sales vehicles do not. The lettering must be at least three inches high, and a subcontractor displays only its own number. Advertising is governed by COMAR 09.08.01.09. A licensed contractor may not solicit home improvement business by advertisement in a newspaper, magazine, circular or printed document, or by television or radio announcement, unless the name and license number of the contractor are stated in the advertisement. No advertisement may contain a false, deceptive or misleading statement of fact, and phrases like Factory to You may not be used unless you actually make the product. Discount coupon offers may not require the coupon before you give an estimate. Guarantee claims must disclose terms, conditions, limits and duration. Business Regulation section 8-501 requires the written contract to carry the contractor's name, address, telephone number and license number, each salesperson's name and license number, start and substantial completion dates, the work and materials, and a notice pointing the homeowner to the Commission.
Sourcesregs.maryland.gov 1regs.maryland.gov 2mgaleg.maryland.gov 3
Working without the license is a criminal matter, not a fee. Business Regulation section 8-601 bars acting as a contractor or selling a home improvement in the State without a contractor or salesperson license, and makes a violation a misdemeanor. A first conviction carries a fine up to one thousand dollars or imprisonment up to six months or both. A second or subsequent conviction carries a fine up to five thousand dollars or imprisonment up to two years or both. The Guaranty Fund pays nothing on work by an unlicensed contractor, which is the real commercial penalty, because a homeowner who learns that mid dispute has no recovery and says so publicly. Verification is easy on both sides, so expect it. The Commission runs a Home Improvement Public Query where anyone can search active licensees by contractor personal name, trade name, location, salesperson name or license number. The Board of Examiners of Landscape Architects runs its own public query for design licensees. The Department of Natural Resources publishes a Licensed Tree Expert search. MDA publishes a directory of for hire professional fertilizer applicators and a pesticide licensing search. Put your MHIC number on the estimate, the website footer and the truck, and tell the homeowner where to check it. In Maryland that is a selling point rather than a disclosure.
Sourcesmgaleg.maryland.gov 1dllr.state.md.us 2dllr.state.md.us 3dnr.maryland.gov 4mda.maryland.gov 5
These are common details other guides publish about Maryland, but we could not verify them from the agency source. Confirm them directly before relying on them.
Routine mowing and mulching is not on the Commission's home improvement work list, but planting, sod, grading and hardscape are. Because most grounds companies sell at least some of that, the practical answer is yes. The Commission's own FAQ says landscape contractors are licensed by the Maryland Home Improvement Commission.
The MHIC contractor license. The Commission's licensing FAQ states that installing paver patios and retaining walls at a residence is home improvement, because the statutory definition reaches an improvement to land adjacent to the residence. Driveways, flagstone, grading, excavating, paving, sidewalks and fences are on the same published list.
Two years of trade experience under COMAR 09.08.01.23. Apprenticeship, employment doing home improvements, and employment on commercial or residential construction, repairs or renovations all count. Supervisor, manager or owner experience can replace one year, and vocational building trade training or a work study program can substitute for the trade experience.
Fifty five questions on the laws and regulations covering running a home improvement business and selling home improvement work, not on horticulture or construction detail. PSI delivers it by computer in two hours for sixty three dollars, and you need seventy percent. A passing score expires after two years.
At least five hundred thousand dollars. Business Regulation section 8-302.1 requires both applicants for a contractor license and licensed contractors to maintain general liability insurance in that amount, a requirement effective June 1, 2024. Older policies written to lower limits need raising before renewal.
Only if your balance sheet does not clear the Commission's solvency standard. COMAR 09.08.01.19 requires a credit report and a statement of outstanding judgments, and an applicant who cannot show sufficient net worth must carry a two year surety bond. The Commission publishes bond forms at thirty thousand and one hundred thousand dollars.
Yes. The Maryland Department of Agriculture names landscapers using Roundup or animal repellents as pesticide businesses, which requires a business license, a certified pest control applicator, and registered employees. Untrained employees may not apply pesticides unless a certified applicator or registered employee is physically present.
The pesticide business license is one hundred fifty dollars a year, the applicator certificate is seventy five dollars for the first category and twenty five dollars for each additional main category, and employee registration is thirty dollars per person. The license year runs July 1 through June 30.
No. Under Maryland's lawn fertilizer law, anyone hired to fertilize lawns must be certified by the Department of Agriculture or supervised by someone certified, and the business needs a fertilizer license. Certification is one hundred dollars, the business license is fifty dollars, and both expire December 31.
A Maryland Licensed Tree Expert, or a worker supervised by one. The Commission points tree work to the Department of Natural Resources, which licenses trimming, pruning, thinning, cabling, shaping, removing or crown reducing trees twenty feet or taller. DNR also requires proof of liability and property damage insurance.
COMAR 09.08.01.06 requires your license number preceded by MHIC # on both sides of every vehicle used for home improvement work, in letters at least three inches high. COMAR 09.08.01.09 requires your name and license number in newspaper, magazine, circular, printed, television and radio advertising.
Not unless a licensee is behind it. Business Occupations and Professions section 9-601 bars practicing, attempting to practice, or offering to practice landscape architecture without a license from the state board. The statutory definition of practice includes site plans, construction documents, and design of grading, drainage and irrigation.
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