These guides focus on open, finaled, closed, expired, and inspection-related status fields shown by official permitting systems. Use How to Find Open Permits on a House as the main starting point, then confirm the jurisdiction-specific meaning of each label with the agency that owns the record.
Review the permit detail, inspection sequence, expiration information, and final documents that the portal actually provides rather than relying on a result-list label alone. A status screen can be incomplete or split across current, legacy, trade, and enforcement systems, while certificates or planning approvals may be stored separately. If the status is ambiguous, record the permit number, the wording shown, the search date, and the responsible office before requesting clarification. A missing final entry can reflect incomplete online coverage as well as an unresolved record, so follow the local guide’s archive or records-request path. The result does not by itself prove that work passed every inspection, matches the building today, or satisfies another department.
A Los Angeles re-roof permit is about four times as likely as a Miami-Dade County one to have no approved inspection on record. Of the 32,066 re-roof permits the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety (LADBS) issued for one- and two-family homes in 2022–2024, 3,697 (11.5%) show no approved inspection as of October 2026. … Read more
In Chicago, 61% of the residential renovation permits issued in 2022 now read “Expired.” In Los Angeles only 3% do, but another 17% still read “Issued” almost four years later, with no final inspection recorded. By project type, window and door jobs lead both cities: 30% of Los Angeles window and door permits have no … Read more
Most Miami-Dade County re-roof permits for houses are issued within days, and the roof inspections take about a month. In our count of 29,883 residential re-roof permits the county issued in 2022–2024, half were issued the day after the application or sooner, and 90% within 16 days. The median permit logged its last approved inspection … Read more
Small repair and exterior jobs end with an expired building permit far more often than new homes. Of Austin’s 2022 residential repair permits, 28% now read “Expired,” against 7% of new-home permits. In Seattle, 23% of the single-family addition and alteration permits issued in 2022 have expired, led by window and door work (36%) and … Read more
Find open permits on a house through the local building department, then check permit status, inspection history, expiration, and close-out records before relying on the result.
Final inspection status can help distinguish issued permits from work that appears closed, finaled, or still open.