Denver, Colorado Building Permit Guide

Denver is Colorado’s largest city and a consolidated city and county. It writes its own amendments to the model codes and publishes them as the Denver Building and Fire Codes — and the process built around them has one mechanism worth understanding before you use it.

Community Planning and Development runs plan review across building, zoning, sewer use and drainage and fire disciplines, including its own electrical and mechanical and plumbing review teams. All projects apply and pay for permits online through E-permits. The 2025 Denver Building and Fire Codes, which adopt the 2024 International Codes (the 2021 energy code) with Denver’s amendments, took effect on 31 December 2025.

This guide covers the City and County of Denver, which is a single consolidated jurisdiction. The surrounding metro cities — Aurora, Lakewood, Thornton, Arvada and the rest — each permit separately and license contractors separately.

What requires a building permit in Denver?

Denver is a consolidated city and county that adopts the International Code Council codes and publishes its own amendments to them in the Denver Building and Fire Codes; the city tells applicants to comply with both the ICC codes and Denver’s amendments. That is possible because Colorado has no statewide building code: home rule leaves adoption to each of roughly 270 municipalities and 64 counties. Denver also charges for re-review caused by another team’s changes: where a review is completed by one entity and another entity then requires changes to the submitted documents, necessitating a re-review by the team that previously reviewed and approved the project, additional fees are charged on an hourly basis at standard rates.

An ordinary repair is defined more narrowly than owners expect, and an exemption from a building permit is never an exemption from zoning, the energy provisions or a trade permit. Confirm scope with Denver Community Planning and Development before work starts.

What the state still governs, even here

Local latitude does not reach everything. The electrical and plumbing trades run against state-adopted codes and state licensing; the energy floor set by House Bill 22-1362 attaches whenever a jurisdiction adopts or updates a building code; and the wildland-urban interface code adopted by the state in 2025 sets a minimum for new construction and significant exterior alterations in designated areas. Where the energy provisions conflict with the Colorado plumbing code or the National Electrical Code, the plumbing code or the electrical code prevails.

Colorado has no statewide building code for private buildings: each city and county decides whether a code applies and which edition, while the state sets electrical and plumbing rules, a minimum energy code on any update, and a wildfire code for the mapped wildland-urban interface. Building codes in Colorado

Who handles permitting in Denver?

Community Planning and Development administers the Denver Building and Fire Code, issues building and trade permits, and routes plan review across the building, zoning, sewer use and drainage and fire disciplines.

The preparatory permit family is more granular than it first appears. A fire alarm conduit-only permit can be issued to the fire alarm or electrical contractor where metallic conduit is required, and it issues only once the preparatory construction permit has been issued. First-time building occupancies must request a zoning verification letter from zoning review and obtain approval from the architectural plans reviewer before submitting under the policy, and neither substitutes for the zoning and building reviews of the logged-in plans.

Shoring and excavation is a separate submittal from the building permit plans and may be filed at any time during the building plan review. It requires shoring calculations and design drawings, a soils report electronically signed and sealed by a Colorado professional engineer, and a civil and architectural site plan locating the excavation and building footprint relative to property lines, roads, alleys, utilities and the limits of excavation including tiebacks and soil nails.

Permit types

Residential permits

Residential work follows the Denver Building and Fire Code with the city’s zoning code applied alongside. New dwellings and remodels increasing the bedroom count require proof of sanitation. Soils reports must be sealed by a Colorado professional engineer, and reports older than two years are subject to the city’s published building code policies.

How Colorado contractor credentials work

Commercial permits

Commercial and tenant-finish work is where the preparatory permit policy applies, and it is worth reading before relying on it. The policy does not apply where a change of occupancy from the previous tenant is required, and the facility conditions attached to it — including suppression and functioning fire alarm requirements — are specific. The Green Buildings Ordinance and deferred and phased construction each have their own published guidance.

Local licences, state trade registration and design professionals

Three credential layers appear on a Colorado project and they are held by three different bodies: the local general contractor licence and any bond the jurisdiction requires; state registration for the electrical and plumbing contractors, verified with the state boards; and, on commercial and larger residential work, drawings stamped by a Colorado-licensed architect or professional engineer. Confirm what Denver Community Planning and Development requires for the specific building before filing.

Colorado has no state general contractor licence (cities and counties license builders), while electricians and plumbers are licensed statewide by the State Electrical and Plumbing Boards. Contractor licensing in Colorado

Denver permit costs and fees

Denver fees are set by the city’s published development services fee structure, with additional hourly charges where a re-review is triggered by another discipline’s changes to previously approved documents.

Because Colorado sets no statewide building fee schedule, two jurisdictions on the same model code can price the same project very differently. The component most often missed is the trade permit: electrical and plumbing permits are separate local permits with their own fees. Ask Denver Community Planning and Development for the schedule in force on your filing date, and confirm the electrical and plumbing route separately.

Colorado has no state building fee schedule, so fees, including electrical and plumbing permit fees, are set locally wherever a local inspection programme exists. Permit fees in Colorado

Trade permits and who may pull them

Electricians and plumbers are licensed by the state, but the state boards issue trade permits only where a city or county has no inspection programme of its own, and inspect all public school work. Trade permits in Colorado

How to apply for a Denver building permit

Review, corrections and what actually causes delay

The first cause of delay in Colorado is the wildland-urban interface, where a parcel inside the mapped area brings requirements the building code alone does not describe. The second is the energy code, because the tier a jurisdiction sits on depends on when it last updated rather than on a statewide date. The third is edition drift between neighbouring jurisdictions on the same corridor. There is no statutory review clock for building permits: any timeline you are given is that jurisdiction’s own target. Confirm the checklist with Denver Community Planning and Development before filing.

Local permit validity is set by Denver; where the state boards issue a trade permit, it runs 12 months from issue. Permit validity in Colorado

Inspections in Denver

Standard checkpoints include footing and foundation, framing, rough-in electrical, plumbing and mechanical, insulation and energy compliance, fire systems on commercial work, and final, with a certificate of occupancy before the building is used. Where a preparatory permit was used, items installed under it are inspected against the finally approved plans rather than the plans in review when they went in.

Do not cover work before the required inspection has been approved. Keep the issued permits, the approved plans and the energy compliance documentation available on site.

Denver permit search and official resources

Permit records in Colorado are split the way the permits are. Where Denver Community Planning and Development is the authority for the City and County of Denver, it holds the building record — and the electrical and plumbing permits too, because this area runs its own electrical and plumbing inspections (the state boards permit only where no local programme exists). If you are buying, refinancing or renovating, check both, because a clean local record does not mean the trade work was ever permitted.

These are the primary sources behind this guide. Codes, fee schedules and procedures change — confirm the position for your filing date.

• Denver commercial permitting guide
• Denver administrative policy 131B, preparatory permits
• Colorado electrical and plumbing permits homepage
• House Bill 22-1362, building greenhouse gas emissions
• Colorado Wildfire Resiliency Code Board

Frequently asked questions

Can I start work before my plans are approved?

On a tenant-finish project, partly, and at your own risk. Denver issues preparatory permits for demolition, non-structural framing, electrical, mechanical, plumbing, fire suppression and fire alarm work, on the explicit understanding that building, zoning, sewer use and drainage, and fire code review is not complete and that changes may be required to items installed under them.

Does Colorado set the code Denver uses?

No. Colorado has no statewide building code. For private buildings, state law leaves adoption to local government, so whether a building code applies at all, and which edition, is decided by the municipality or the county — roughly 270 municipalities and 64 counties, each choosing for itself. House Bill 22-1362 does not compel any jurisdiction to update, but when a jurisdiction adopts or updates a building code it must take up at least the specified minimum energy code, so the energy floor arrives with the update rather than on a statewide date; for updates made on or after 1 July 2026 that floor is the state’s Model Low Energy and Carbon Code. Where the energy provisions or the state model codes conflict with the Colorado plumbing code or the National Electrical Code, the plumbing code or the electrical code prevails.

Who issues my electrical and plumbing permits?

The city’s own inspection programme. The trades are the part Colorado does decide centrally. The State Electrical Board and the State Plumbing Board issue permits and inspect only where a city or county has no electrical and plumbing inspection programme of its own. This area has one, so the trade permits are issued locally; the state still inspects electrical, plumbing and gas work in public schools. Electricians and plumbers are licensed by those state boards and the licences are statewide, while general contractors are licensed by municipalities and counties, often with a surety bond. It is a violation of state law for anyone other than the homeowner, who is not a registered electrical or plumbing contractor, to install that work, and the homeowner exception covers only work you do yourself on a home you live in that is not for sale or rent.

Why am I being charged an hourly fee for a re-review?

Because a previously approved review had to be revisited. Where a review is completed by one entity and another entity requires changes to the submitted documents, necessitating a re-review by the team that previously reviewed and approved the project, additional fees are charged hourly at standard rates.

How old can my soils report be?

Soils reports must be electronically signed and sealed by a Colorado professional engineer, and reports older than two years are subject to the city's published building code policies rather than being accepted automatically.

Is shoring part of the building permit?

No. Shoring and excavation is a separate submittal from the building permit plans and may be submitted at any time during the building plan review process, with calculations, design drawings, a sealed soils report and a civil and architectural site plan.

Simplify Denver permitting with Alliance Permitting

Denver’s preparatory permits are genuinely useful and genuinely risky. Knowing which is which on a given project is the job.

Trusted by leading builders, developers, and national contractors — 21+ years of filing in the jurisdictions we write about.

Contractors and builders choose Alliance for Denver because the work is done by people who have stood at the counter:

• 21+ years of filing, so the trade authority is settled before the application goes in
• We confirm which edition the jurisdiction adopted and when it last updated
• Local general contractor licence and state trade registration both verified, in different places
• Wildland-urban interface position checked against the state map before the design is fixed
• Two inspection queues sequenced so a cover-up never waits on the wrong inspector

Alliance Permitting is a permit documentation and submission company in Colorado. We prepare your paperwork, file it correctly and coordinate with the permitting authority through issuance. We are not a contractor and we do not perform licensed plan review or inspections; that work stays with your licensed team and the jurisdiction.

This guide is provided by Alliance Permitting for general information about Denver permitting. Requirements, fees, and procedures change; confirm details with the permitting authority before relying on them.