Close Your Permits?
I recently had to call Hartford’s Licenses and Inspections department to check on some permits for a particular house in Hartford. I was looking to understand if permits had been pulled for work performed at the house and if they had been closed out by a city inspector.
The L&I office has always been helpful whenever I’ve stopped by to check on permits for homes or just answer general questions I have about the L&I process. My recent conversation was a little frustrating though because the process seemed a little broken. Here’s how it went down…
Amy [on phone]: Hi, I’d like to get an understanding of what permits have been pulled for 123 XYZ Street and if they’ve been closed out.
L&I Employee [on phone]: Sure, let me check. But our computer system only goes back to 1990, so that’s as far as I’ll be able to tell you over the phone. Otherwise you’ll need to come in and do a record search.
Amy: That’s fine. Going back to 1990 is good enough for now.
L&I Employee: Okay. I see that there are 6 permits pulled, various building permits and plumbing permits, and they were pulled between 1992 and 2007.
Amy: Sounds good, I’m glad to hear that the permits were pulled. How many of them are closed out?
L&I Employee: None of them are closed. They all still show in an “open” status. But that doesn’t mean that they are necessarily open. The inspector may have gone out to check the work and the job card never got recorded to actually close out the permit.
Amy: Uh, so how am I supposed to tell if they are closed or not?
L&I Employee: Well, you can come down here and talk with the inspectors and see if they remember closing out the job.
Amy: But you said there are permits pulled from 1992. What are the chances the inspector still works in the department and that s/he will remember closing out a job from 1992?
L&I Employee: I can’t really comment on that. If you want to see if they’ve been closed out, you’ll need to come here in person and ask an inspector.
So there are a couple of takeaways from my phone conversation:
1. While the employees in Hartford’s Licenses and Inspections department are very helpful, it appears that they’re limited by the current recording process in order to get permits closed out. Inspectors could potentially be wasting a lot of time revisting jobs that have already been closed, but no record exists that they were actually closed. I think that is what is going to need to happen in my case.
2. As the homeowner, you should keep records of who performed the work at your home (which should be a licensed contractor) and the name of the inspector that comes to close out the job. That way if this situation happens to you, there is a paper trail to follow.
I’ll be headed to the Licenses & Inspections department today to do a little more investigation. Stay tuned for my dramatic conclusion…
UPDATE: So I stopped by L&I today. None of the permits were closed. I was told to call certain inspectors to see if they knew they had been closed, but not recorded as closed. More digging must be done. The people in the office assured me that there is a new process now, so this shouldn’t be happening anymore. It’s just older permits that might have this issue.
Would a proactive buyer or seller research this before making an offer or listing the home? Would this come up during the title search? Does a contract need a contingency for this, in your opinion?
Also, I’ve seen houses listed for sale with data that conflicts with the assessor’s data. What should the buyer or seller do if the assessor’s card is not accurate with respect to the number of bathrooms or the heating system (oil vs. gas)?
When I talk to sellers about listing their home, I always ask them if they’ve had town permits pulled for work they’ve had performed on the house. If they haven’t, I always recommend that they get them retroactively.
A proactive buyer, or their agent, can search town records to see if permits have been pulled on the house and if they’ve been closed out. I typically don’t recommend that it initially go into the contract as a contingency, but you could make it a contingency coming out of home inspection if there were concerns. I do not believe permits are searched during the title search.
Regarding assessor’s data that is incorrect, it’s really up to the buyer and seller to determine if they want to alert town hall to have it changed. It will affect the tax assessment of the property, so sometimes people are hesitant to report it, particularly if it is currently in their favor for lower taxes.