How long do building permits take?

By Mario Bailey Last checked 2026-07-12

We measured 128,021 real permit records from the official open-data portals of 7 US jurisdictions. Every number below is a median of actual records, not an estimate and not a quote from a permit office. The spread is wide: a residential permit that takes a median 19 days in Austin takes a median 57 days in Chicago.

Look up your city

Pick a measured jurisdiction to see its numbers in context. The full tables below cover everything.

Jurisdiction Permit type

Median days from application to issue, slowest first

Jurisdiction	Median days to issue	Records measured
Chicago, Illinois	57 days	5,329
Montgomery County, Maryland	20 days	6,440
Austin, Texas	19 days	39,585

Only jurisdictions whose open data includes both an application and an issue date (or a processing-time field) appear here.

By permit type, fastest first

Permit type	Jurisdiction	Median days	Records
Shed permit	Montgomery County, Maryland	10 days	322
Electrical permit	Austin, Texas	10 days	11,464
Deck permit	Montgomery County, Maryland	12 days	780
HVAC permit	Austin, Texas	12 days	7,592
Plumbing permit	Austin, Texas	15 days	11,790
Pool permit	Montgomery County, Maryland	35 days	107

Median permit fees, highest first

Jurisdiction	Median fee paid	Median project value	Records
Chicago, Illinois	$1,142	$118,600	5,329
Mesa, Arizona	$520	$384,385	5,364
Boston, Massachusetts	$90	$8,700	19,468

Fees are not comparable across cities without context: they scale with project value and scope, and each dataset covers a different mix of work. Median project value is shown for that reason.

Methodology

Each jurisdiction publishes raw permit records on an official open-data portal. We pull the most recent 12 months of residential records, compute medians (never means, which outliers distort), and require at least 20 records before publishing any number. Turnaround is measured from application date to issue date where both exist, or from the dataset's own processing-time field. Datasets differ in what they expose, which is why not every city appears in every table. Figures refresh when we re-pull the data; this page was last refreshed 2026-07-12.

Sources

Montgomery County residential building permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Mesa building permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Chicago building permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Austin issued construction permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Los Angeles building permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Seattle built-environment permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)
City of Boston approved building permits (open data) (2025-07-12 to 2026-07-12)

Looking for your own jurisdiction? Every locality we cover has a permit office page: browse all permits.