CONTRACTOR GLOSSARY · FIELD & PAPERWORK
What is a Subcontractor?
A subcontractor performs a specialized portion of a project — electrical, plumbing, HVAC — under contract with the general contractor rather than the owner.
Subs are the trades: licensed specialists who contract with the GC to deliver their scope. The defining feature of the position is being one contractual step from the money. The owner pays the GC; the GC pays you — on the GC's timeline, subject to "pay-when-paid" clauses, requisition cycles, and retainage.
That's why the paperwork stack that protects subcontractors is different from what protects GCs: preliminary notices and mechanics liens (rights against an owner you never contracted with), signed daily records (evidence independent of the GC's log), and per-GC receivable tracking (because your risk concentrates in whoever owes you across multiple jobs).
Common questions
Can a subcontractor lien a property without a contract with the owner?
Generally yes — mechanics lien laws exist largely for this case — but most states require subs to send preliminary notices and hit strict deadlines to preserve that right. See our state lien guides.
RevnuPros tracks the thing, not just the word
Permits to sign-off, T&M tags to signature, materials to billed through, retainage to released — built for subcontractors. Browse the full contractor glossary or the Massachusetts permit guide.
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