City
Washington, DC, DC
Search Washington, DC building permits by street or address. See the permit, its status, the work, and the dates, straight from DC GIS (DCRA feeds). This is the property history paid lookup sites charge for, free and in your browser.
District of Columbia building permits issued in 2026, about 27,000 records. DC publishes one layer per calendar year back to 2009; earlier years are not searchable here.
Covers the District of Columbia. DC has no county layer; the District issues all building permits directly.
Source: DC GIS (DCRA feeds). Public domain (District of Columbia). Permits are published by the DC Department of Buildings via the DCRA feed service. Open the city portal.
Buyers and renters check a property for open code cases and unpermitted work before they commit. Homeowners confirm a contractor pulled the permit they paid for, and that it closed. Neighbors look up a problem property near them. Investors, agents, and inspectors fold the violation and permit history into due diligence. Paid services charge per report for these public records; the city's data is open, so this tool is free.
The building permits pulled for work on a Washington, DC property: what was built or repaired and when, and, where the city records it, who did the work.
It is pulled live from DC GIS (DCRA feeds) each time you search; nothing is cached on our end. The coverage line under each tab states the exact span that dataset covers, so you always know how fresh the records are.
Only properties with a record on file appear. Many properties have no recent permit, which is normal, not an error. Try the street name on its own, or a nearby address.
It is what DC GIS (DCRA feeds) publishes openly, which is the city's own record. For the certified file, or for very recent activity that has not synced yet, use the official city portal linked under the results.
Parcel lookup answers who owns a property and its assessed value, from the county. A property report answers what has happened to the building, from the city: building permits. They complement each other.
Related: County parcel lookup · City zoning cases · All covered cities · Dallas property report · Chicago property report · Nashville property report · Austin property report · Seattle property report · New York City property report · San Francisco property report · Detroit property report · Las Vegas property report · Kansas City property report · Columbus property report · Boston property report · San Antonio property report · Milwaukee property report · Charlotte property report · Denver property report · Philadelphia property report · Atlanta property report · Phoenix property report