Massachusetts remodeling contractor marketing with your HIC number on the van, the listing and the contract

Structural kitchen and bath work here can call for a Construction Supervisor License as well as HIC registration. Your ads and contracts should name the right holder of each.

The state's construction supervisor page says a licensed construction supervisor or a registered design professional must oversee construction on one- and two-family homes. Opening a wall for a bigger kitchen is the kind of job that brings it in.

The HIC page uses a kitchen renovation as its example of work that may need both credentials. It adds that one person need not hold both. The firm that signs the contract with the homeowner is the one that needs the HIC registration.

That shapes the copy. A firm whose lead carpenter holds the supervisor license can say a licensed construction supervisor runs its jobs. It should not print that license number as if it were the company's registration. The company's HIC number is the one the ad rule asks for.

Builders from over the border need one more check. Massachusetts does not recognize other states' contractor licenses, as the construction supervisor page says. A New Hampshire or Rhode Island remodeler taking jobs in Lowell or Attleboro needs Massachusetts credentials before the ads go live.

A Massachusetts homeowner who feels misled by an ad can come after you directly. So every price and warranty line deserves a second read before it runs.

Under Chapter 93A, the homeowner has to mail a written demand and wait 30 days before filing suit. Answer inside that month with a reasonable written settlement offer, and your exposure is capped at what you offered. Ignore it in bad faith, or break the law knowingly, and a court can double or triple the damages and add the homeowner's legal bills.

So give these letters an owner. Someone should watch the inbox and the mail, date each letter the day it arrives and get it to counsel well inside the 30 days.

Advertised prices have their own rule. The Attorney General's fee rule has applied since September 2, 2025. Whenever a price appears, starting with the first time, it must show the total with every required fee, and the total must be the most prominent price. A bath package that adds a disposal fee at signing fails that test. A set-price package also cannot hide its total behind a form that asks for a phone number first. The rule's text does not say how it treats a custom estimate, where no price exists yet.

Sale prices get checked too. The retail advertising rule covers services as well as goods. A "was" price is safe when, among other routes, the old price was openly offered for the 14 days before the ad. It also expects you to hold proof for a claim before you publish it.

"Lifetime" needs a definition. Chapter 93A tells Massachusetts courts to be guided by how the FTC reads deceptive practices. The FTC's warranty advertising guides say an ad that calls a warranty "lifetime" should say whose life it means. "Lifetime warranty on the shower base, for as long as you own the home" passes that test. "Lifetime warranty" alone leaves the question open.

Kitchens are planned for months, so much of the selling happens on follow-up calls. Massachusetts has its own rules for those calls, on top of the federal ones.

The state's telemarketing law keeps unsolicited sales calls out of the evening and early morning. Nothing may ring after 8 at night or before 8 in the morning, by the homeowner's clock. A recorded sales message is out at any hour.

The state keeps its own do-not-call list. It takes in every Massachusetts number on the national registry, under the Office of Consumer Affairs rule. Under that rule, a firm that cold calls files with the Office and pays its fee every year, on or before January 1.

Some calls are not "unsolicited" at all. The law's definitions leave out a call the homeowner asked for. A past client whose last job with you falls inside 24 months, and who has not opted out, is also fair to ring. So is a homeowner when nothing gets sold or paid for until you sit down together, which can cover a call that just sets up a design visit at the house. The national no-call registry and federal consent rules reach that call anyway.

Callers have a script duty too. Inside the opening minute, the caller announces that this is a sales pitch and names both the calling company and the firm it sells for, under section 5A.

The penalties are real. The penalty section allows the Attorney General to ask a court for as much as $5,000 per knowing violation. A homeowner rung unlawfully twice or more in a year by the same firm can also bring a suit of their own, for up to $5,000.

Texts are a gray area. The Massachusetts statute talks about a call or a message, and the word text never appears in it. Our working rule is to run sales texts on federal consent, as our texting and AI answering playbook explains.

Picture a bot dialing every homeowner who sat through a design consult last winter. The FCC's February 2024 ruling treats that AI voice as artificial, which puts the bot under the federal rule for prerecorded calls.

That federal calling rule requires the homeowner's prior express written consent before such a sales call goes out. An AI receptionist that answers calls homeowners make is a different job from one that dials out to sell.

Recording needs care as well. Massachusetts bars secretly recording a call without every party's consent, under its wiretap law, so tell callers at the start when a call is recorded.