Does this job need a permit. It comes up early on a renovation, and the answer depends on what you are changing. The permit office is the one to confirm it for your job before work starts. What follows is how to think about the question, and what to ask.
Jobs worth asking about
The rough line is whether you are changing the building or only its surface. Work that touches structure, the systems inside the walls, or the footprint of the house is the kind of work to raise with the permit office before you commit to a scope.
- Additions, and anything that changes the footprint or the roofline
- Removing a wall, opening one up, or altering a beam, column or slab
- Moving plumbing, so a sink, shower or waste line ends up in a new position
- New or relocated electrical circuits, a panel change, or a new service
- Steel canopies and carports, and other structures anchored to the ground or to the house
- Converting a space to a use it was not built for, such as closing in a carport to make a room
Where like-for-like stops being like-for-like
Cosmetic replacement reads differently: paint, flooring laid over an existing slab, new cabinet doors, a fixture swapped for another one in the same position, ordinary maintenance. The trap is that like-for-like stops being like-for-like quietly. Move the sink to another wall and you have new supply and waste. Add an outlet where there was none and you are into the circuit. Take out a wall to open up a kitchen and you may be holding the roof on a header that did not exist yesterday. The paperwork follows the work, not the intention, so ask again when the scope moves.
Why somebody else's unpermitted work becomes your problem
Unpermitted work does not go away. It stays in the house, and it can surface later: when you sell, when you refinance, or when someone looks closely after a storm. A carport that has been closed in and appears on no record, or a bedroom where the drawings show a lanai, is a question that arrives at the house you own now, not at whoever built it.
You also meet it mid-renovation. Open a ceiling, find wiring nobody ever declared, and it has to be dealt with before new work goes on top of it. That is normal in older houses here, and it is easier to deal with when it turns up during a walkthrough than when a crew is already on site.
Who does what
The building side is ours. We prepare the drawings and details for the work, we hand over our licence and insurance information, we sequence the job so the work is still open when someone needs to look at it, and we are there when they do. Our licence is CLB22-1786. Ask any contractor you talk to for theirs, and check it.
The owner side stays with you. You are the property owner on the application, the lot and ownership information comes from you, and the permit office will tell you what else it wants from an owner and what it charges for. Skipping that part does not remove the work. It leaves it in the house for whoever owns it when it is found.
Ask first, and ask for this job
Requirements change, and a blog post is a poor place to learn them. Confirm what your job needs with the permit office before you commit to a scope, and treat anything you read online, this page included, as background.
If you would rather start with the building than the paperwork, we will come and look at it. Matt walks the job himself and tells you what the work involves and what we would expect to prepare for it. The walkthrough and the estimate are free. Call 671 683-8332.
