Remodel with permits vs without

8 years ago

I don't advocate doing large scale remodeling without a permit but there are days when I roll my eyes a lot.

I called for an inspection and mentioned that my electrician will be here today to put in a missing cup. The inspector got very upset because apparently no contractor is allowed to work in my city on a federal holiday. That never stopped my neighbors' workers who starts at 7 and work til 9pm 7 days a week and thru every holiday this year.

It took me several mins to soothe him. He finally allowed it since the electrician is working on his own time after hours and will be only screwing in a cup socket for a pendant that his journeyman missed.

Fyi, in my city, you can't sell the house until you have an inspection so that they can collect all permit revenues for missed remodels. However they miss the remodeling signs a lot.

Three neighbors on the same street redid their kitchens at the same time without permits and were done in 2 months. One finished an entire house demo and added a balcony.

I've spent 7 months and still not done (this doesn't count the 5 months that my mother and I were in the hospital and no work was done). Repiping alone took 3 months as the company jumped thru hoops for the city on a job that only takes them 1 day and approval is instant in other cities. Nothing else was allowed to be done until the city was happy.

Neighbors' repiping under the radar took a week to two - smaller crew than my specialty company. Their cost was also a third to half of mine since they skipped some safety precautions.

Ah the joys of bureaucracy.

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Comments (5)

PRO
StarCraft Custom Builders
8 years ago
So, what is your question? Remodeling without the required permits where permits are required is a fool's game.
cookncarpenter
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
Any work without a permit will come back to haunt you when (if) it comes time to sell. Karma will get your neighbor in the end. Do it right, and laugh at him when he can't unload his non conforming POS... or better yet, it catches on fire and his insurance won't pay because it was not permitted or to code ;)
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Give it some time and more knowledgeable people will come and answer. I know a red-taged item cannot be put in service. It would be against the law for someone to turn on your fan, or to hook up electrical service to it if it were not hooked up already. For a professional, it would likely be a licensing issue. For you, it is an outstanding violation that probably means you cannot sell your house. There is essentially a lien against your title if you continue to ignore it. These are all my guesses, based on things I have read. I googled, "What happens if I don't fix a red-tag violation in my house" and found one town said this: "Red tags must be recalled for inspection and paid, if applicable, within seven working (7) days. Failure of the contractors or owner/builders to request and receive re-inspections before proceeding with additional work may result in disciplinary action or a fine against the contractor or owner/builder." If you live in an incorporated city or village, go to the website, there is likely a FAQ with lots of info and maybe your question is answered. If you are not in an incorporated area, go to the county site - whatever governmental entity sent out the inspector. See if you can figure out the answer. Or just call the permit office and ask what happens when a red tag is ignored.
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I think to some degree, people do unpermitted work because of various problems with the permitting and inspection process. Here, the inspection process can be anything from so cursory as to be non-existent or so nit-picky as to be impossible to please the inspector(s) 1) Cursory: a client of mine installed a gas, vented fireplace with a chimney through the roof. It was permitted (as was the entire project), and I was present for the inspection which involved the inspector getting out of the car, looking up at the top of the chimney coming through the roof (which you could only see the top of), saying "That's the chimney?" checking off a box, and driving away. 2) Impossible: a township over, *two* inspectors, a team, inspected a kitchen and had an argument about the single handled faucet (an American made faucet) because one of them thought that "the ergonomics did not reflect the fact that hot is to the left and cold is to the right, that the way the handle worked was 'wrong'". They would not pass the house until a different faucet was installed. After which the plumber came back and put in the faucet they wanted again. In the city, because of the housing stock, (mostly 19th century and on lots as narrow as 12 feet), it would be impossible to meet the modern code for clearances or "on center" positions for bath fixtures, and the modern code for stairs. Luckily they are pretty generous about grandfathering certain things because you can't get blood out of a stone (there's no way to add square footage to these houses), but people do work under the radar because of fear of having to change something that is almost impossible, and definitely expensive to change. That said, since much work is done unpermitted, a lot of it is lousy. I am surprised my house hasn't burnt down or flooded due to the terrible and dangerous work I am uncovering in my bathroom demolitions. But I think, like I said, this is partly to blame on the inspection process and certain types of inspectors who are either so lazy as to make it pointless or on a power trip about something they have a bug up their butt about.
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Permit required in my city for just replacing an electric hot water heater... Lucky us. The rule is, you need to go talk to your permitting office about the requirement for a permit in each of those situations, and since they didn't have one, and you bought the house, what you need to do now. Then, you can think about "recourse". Until then, you don't even know if any recourse is needed or worthwhile.
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You won't find many engineers that will develop a plan without seeing what is existing. You're going to have to do a little bit of demolition before an engineer can assess the existing structure. Many times there are surprises lurking in that ceiling. That said, every jurisdiction has their own specific requirements when it comes to permitting, so a visit and a short chat with a building official should answer your questions. Many times an engineer isn't required for simple structural work. You might want to get an estimate for the framing portion of your job (if DIY) from a qualified contractor. Usually estimates are free and he should know the process in your town.
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practigal
8 years ago
I don't know...there has been a lot of scandal about city inspectors being on the take in southern CA. I presume you are just venting beachem because most of the rest of the country doesn't have the issues we do. What does surprise me is that your inspector is ignoring your neighbors....the last time the inspector was here, he saw the construction next door and closed it down...and he closed it down accross the street too when that guy had demoed the entire house, scraped the lot and was building a 7000 sq ft house without permits...well the guy across the street did have "something" from a guy at the city he bribed, not a permit but good enough for a two year battle with the city...Construction in socal is like peyton place.
beachem
Original Author
8 years ago
Per my next door neighbor, contributions to the city councilors will take care of any issues. He's not worried about the inspectors at all. So far they've ignored all his construction but did go after the neighbor on the other side regarding their repiping.

Yes I'm just venting because I'm doing the right thing and it's been difficult and expensive. It doesn't help that the entire neighborhood thinks I'm an idiot for getting permits.
Kristen R
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
When we were looking for a house, here in the wild wild west of SoCal, there was one listing that just seemed too good to be true. It was a listing for two great little houses on the same property in a nice neighborhood. Live in one, rent one kind of deal. But the asking price was really, really low. Even below the frequent "I'll list it low to create a bidding war" that you see a lot of around here. My realtor did some digging and discovered the reason for the lowball asking price...

The second house was completely unpermitted. I can't remember if the area was even zoned for multi family or not but someone built an entire second house on their property without getting any approval from anyone. And no one noticed! It seemed kind of crazy to me. We decided to pass on looking at that one.

Remodel with permits vs without

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Remodel with permits vs without

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cookncarpenter

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practigal

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Kristen R

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beachem
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