Deposits are staged across contract milestones rather than paid at once. A typical structure ties payments to events: an amount at contract signing, another at groundbreaking, another as construction reaches defined stages, with the balance due at closing when the unit is delivered. Each project sets its own schedule in the purchase agreement.
Florida law governs how developer deposits are held and what portion sits in escrow, and the contract spells out the conditions under which funds can be used for construction. Reading those provisions, and knowing which developer is behind them, is a core part of the diligence.
The staged structure is why buyers plan liquidity across the whole construction timeline, not just the signing date. Rangely walks buyers through each project's actual deposit schedule and flags the contract terms that differ from the market's usual pattern before anything is signed.