New York's mold license law, for Buffalo homeowners

What counts as a project

Section 930 defines a covered project as mold work on areas larger than ten square feet. Routine cleaning isn't a project, and neither is construction or repair work done for some reason other than mold. Fixing the moisture source is also left out of the definition of remediation, which is why the roofer or plumber who stops the leak doesn't need a mold license.

Who is exempt

Section 933 lets these people do the work without a license:

• Homeowners working on their own residential property.
• Owners, and their employees, working on an apartment building of four or fewer units that they own.
• Owners and their managing agents or full-time staff working on commercial property or larger apartment buildings they own or manage, as long as they don't sell mold work to the public.
• Government agencies on their own property.

The second one matters in Buffalo, where so much of the rental stock is doubles and small multi-unit houses. A landlord's own maintenance person can clean mold in the landlord's building without a mold license. The landlord still has to fix it properly; the warranty of habitability doesn't care who holds the scrub brush. Mold in a rental.

The conflict rule

Section 936 requires an assessor who is paid for an assessment to give the client a written report, and it bars a licensee from performing both the assessment and the remediation on the same property, or holding an interest in both companies on that job. That's the part that protects you: the assessor sets the scope, the remediator bids on it, and then the assessor, who gains nothing by waving a bad job through, checks it. Of the 958 active remediation contractor licenses statewide, 212 belong to businesses that also hold an assessment license (our name match of NY Department of Labor records, October 29, 2026). That's legal, one role per property.

What the plan has to say

Under section 945, the assessor's plan is specific to the project and goes to the client before work starts. It lists the work areas and estimated quantities of material, the methods, the clearance criteria, and a cost estimate and timeframe, and where possible it names the moisture source and who should fix it. Any disinfectant or coating it calls for must be EPA-registered for that use.

Clearance

Section 947 sends the assessor back after the work. There must be no visible mold in the work area, the work must match the plan and its clearance criteria, and the underlying cause should be fixed as far as feasible. Pass, and you get a written passed clearance report. Fail, and you and the remediation contractor get a final status report saying what comes next. Keep the clearance report with the house papers; a buyer's inspector will ask for it someday.

How to check a license

The NY Department of Labor publishes every mold contractor license on data.ny.gov and updates it daily. Search the business name, check the type (SH125 is assessment, SH126 is remediation), and make sure the status reads Active. As of October 29, 2026, 24 active remediation and 21 active assessment contractor licenses list an Erie County address. The crew needs individual licenses too: statewide there are 1,920 active mold supervisor licenses and 2,068 abatement worker licenses.