Legalization and plumbing permits

Any time you change the structural, electrical, plumbing or mechanical configurations of any part of a home or building, you need a permit and inspection. Certain installations, such as a water heater, also require a permit. For more information on when a permit is or isn’t needed, contact us or your local Building Department. 

Westchester County has 48 different municipalities along with NYC‘s Building Department and all have different fees based on the scope of work performed.  We offer free estimates and all permit costs are explicitly stated. 

Insurance may not extend to un-permitted improvements. Liability insurance typically does not cover the portions of a property that have been improved without a permit (illegally improved).  Josephine The Plumber’s work is done with permits & inspections; and all work is warrantied. 

Plumbing alterations can be costly and mistakes can be even more costly. Good plumbing is not cheap & cheap plumbing is not good. The risks associated with illegal or bad plumbing work will cost more money in the long run.  Quality is achieved by doing the right thing  the first (and every) time.  

Noreen and Eileen were an elderly couple who lived in the same house for over forty years. When they decided to retire and sell their home, they ran into a slight problem.  Twenty years earlier, they hired an unlicensed plumber who installed a NEW GAS hot water heater without a permit. The title company produced Department of Buildings records showing the hot water was made by their oil boiler and not the new GAS water heater they had installed. Now the sale of their property was held up for a year and the house sat vacant while Noreen and Eileen had already relocated. During this time, they had to maintain a property they no longer lived in. This meant paying property taxes, maintenance, and heating an empty house. After ten months of this, Josephine The Plumber was recommended to legalize the existing plumbing and file permits. The Department of Buildings fines cost Noreen and Eileen more than $10,000.  Some minor modifications were needed to make the gas piping code complaint, and this meant permits and even more time.  How much did they save working without a permit? Maybe $1000 ? In the end, Noreen and Eileen were forced to wait a year and spend over $30,000 for a job that would have cost about $3,000 if they had obtained permits and done it legally.