🏗️ US Building Permit Scraper

Search any keyword across 248 US cities at once — or scrape by city + date range. The only building permit actor with nationwide keyword search.

Overview

Search for "solar", "HVAC", "demolition", or any phrase and get every matching permit back from all 248 supported cities in a single run. Or target a specific city and date range for a full permit pull.

Covers 63%+ of the US population across Accela, Socrata, ArcGIS, EnerGov, and 70+ city-specific scrapers — no configuration needed. Drop in a city name and go.

Supported platforms:

Platform	Cities	US Pop Coverage	Keyword Search
Accela	163	32.1%	✅
EnerGov	37	6.1%	✅
Socrata	6 (NYC, LA, Chicago…)	11.7%	✅
ArcGIS FeatureServer	10	3.7%	✅
Phoenix PDD (custom)	1	1.1%	✅
DC DCGIS	1	0.5%	✅
Portland MapServer	1	0.4%	✅
City-specific scrapers	70+	~10%	✅

Total: 248 cities, 88M+ people covered

Input

Single city

{
  "city": "Chicago",
  "state": "IL",
  "startDate": "2025-01-01",
  "endDate": "2025-01-31"
}

Batch mode — multiple cities

{
  "cities": [
    {"city": "New York", "state": "NY"},
    {"city": "Los Angeles", "state": "CA"},
    {"city": "Dallas", "state": "TX"}
  ],
  "startDate": "2025-01-01",
  "endDate": "2025-01-31"
}

Keyword search across all cities

{
  "keyword": "solar",
  "searchAllCities": true,
  "startDate": "2025-01-20",
  "endDate": "2025-01-27"
}

All input fields

Field	Type	Default	Description
city	string	—	City name (e.g. "Chicago")
state	string	—	State name or 2-letter abbreviation
cities	array	—	Batch mode: [{city, state}, ...]
startDate	string	7 days ago	Start date YYYY-MM-DD
endDate	string	today	End date YYYY-MM-DD
maxPermits	integer	0 (unlimited)	Max permits returned per city
keyword	string	—	Filter permits by keyword (e.g. "solar", "HVAC", "demolition")
searchAllCities	boolean	false	Search all 287+ supported cities. Best used with keyword.
includePlaywright	boolean	false	When searchAllCities is true, also include Accela/EnerGov cities (163+ more, browser-based, slower). Auto-enabled when keyword is set.
maxCitiesPerRun	integer	0 (unlimited)	Cap cities when using searchAllCities
concurrencyApi	integer	8	Parallel scrapers for API-based cities
concurrencyBrowser	integer	3	Parallel browser instances for Accela/EnerGov
proxyConfig	object	—	Apify proxy config for Playwright scrapers

Output

Each record follows a normalized schema:

{
  "permit_number": "B25-001234",
  "city": "Chicago",
  "state": "Illinois",
  "address": "5139 S LECLAIRE AVE",
  "permit_type": "PERMIT – EXPRESS PERMIT PROGRAM",
  "description": "INSTALL SOLAR PANELS ON ROOF OF PRINCIPAL BUILDING",
  "status": "COMPLETE",
  "apply_date": "2025-01-02",
  "issue_date": "2025-01-02",
  "value": "18500",
  "contractor": "SUNRUN INSTALLATION SERVICES INC",
  "owner": "PROPERTY OWNER LLC",
  "source_platform": "socrata",
  "source_url": "https://data.cityofchicago.org/resource/ydr8-5enu.json",
  "scraped_at": "2025-01-31T18:00:00+00:00"
}

Data is pulled live from city portals on each run — always current as of the moment the actor executes. Fields may be empty strings if not provided by the source portal.

Use Cases

• Solar / roofing contractors — find recently permitted jobs in your market
• Real estate & construction intel — track building activity by city, type, or contractor
• Lead generation — new construction permits = new potential customers
• Market research — permit volume trends by city or permit type
• Compliance monitoring — track specific addresses or contractors

Supported Cities

248 cities across 40 states + DC. Sorted by population within each state. Don't see yours? Email daniel@paxiq.com to request it.

State	Cities
AK	Anchorage
AL	Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, Huntsville
AR	Little Rock
AZ	Phoenix, Tucson, Mesa, Chandler, Gilbert, Scottsdale, Tempe, Yuma, Avondale, Goodyear
CA	Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, San Francisco, Fresno, Sacramento, Long Beach, Oakland, Bakersfield, Anaheim, Santa Ana, Riverside, Stockton, Chula Vista, Irvine, San Bernardino, Modesto, Fontana, Huntington Beach, Glendale, Santa Clarita, Ontario, Santa Rosa, Rancho Cucamonga, Elk Grove, Lancaster, Corona, Palmdale, Salinas, Escondido, Torrance, Pasadena, Thousand Oaks, Visalia, Roseville, Concord, Santa Clara, Berkeley, El Monte, Downey, Costa Mesa, Inglewood, Carlsbad, Fairfield, Richmond, Antioch, San Mateo, Jurupa Valley, Vista, Hesperia, Westminster, Santa Barbara, San Leandro, Whittier, Hawthorne, Citrus Heights, Livermore, Indio, Menifee, Chino, Napa, Chino Hills, Alameda, Pleasanton, Perris, Manteca, Yorba Linda, Walnut Creek, Pittsburg, Palo Alto, Davis, Yuba City
CO	Denver, Colorado Springs, Aurora, Fort Collins, Lakewood, Westminster, Boulder, Greeley, Longmont, Loveland
CT	Stamford, Hartford
DC	Washington
FL	Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Hialeah, Tallahassee, Fort Lauderdale, Port St. Lucie, Cape Coral, Pembroke Pines, Hollywood, Miramar, Gainesville, Coral Springs, Clearwater, Plantation, Deltona, Largo, Melbourne, Weston, Fort Myers
GA	Atlanta, Columbus, Albany
HI	Honolulu
IA	Des Moines
ID	Boise, Meridian
IL	Chicago, Aurora, Naperville, Springfield, Arlington Heights, Evanston
IN	Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, South Bend, Carmel
KS	Wichita, Kansas City, Olathe, Topeka, Lawrence
KY	Louisville
LA	New Orleans
MA	Boston, Worcester, Springfield, Cambridge
MD	Baltimore
ME	Portland
MI	Detroit, Grand Rapids, Rochester Hills
MN	Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester, St. Cloud
MO	Kansas City, St. Louis, Independence, St. Joseph
MT	Missoula
NC	Charlotte, Raleigh, Greensboro, Durham, Fayetteville, Cary, Wilmington, High Point, Concord
ND	Fargo
NE	Omaha, Lincoln
NJ	Paterson, Elizabeth
NM	Albuquerque, Las Cruces
NV	Las Vegas, Henderson, Reno, North Las Vegas, Sparks
NY	New York, Rochester, Syracuse, Albany
OH	Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Dayton
OK	Oklahoma City, Tulsa
OR	Portland, Salem, Eugene, Gresham, Hillsboro
PA	Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Reading
SC	Charleston
SD	Sioux Falls
TN	Memphis, Nashville, Knoxville, Clarksville, Franklin
TX	Dallas, Austin, Fort Worth, El Paso, Arlington, Plano, Lubbock, Amarillo, Brownsville, Pasadena, McKinney, Mesquite, McAllen, Carrollton, Allen, Wichita Falls, Pharr, Coppell, Rosenberg, La Porte, Southlake, Princeton
UT	Salt Lake City
VA	Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Richmond, Newport News, Alexandria
WA	Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, Yakima, Pasco
WI	Milwaukee, Madison
WV	Charleston

Running Locally

# Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt
playwright install chromium

# Single city
python src/main.py --city Chicago --state IL --start 2025-01-01 --end 2025-01-31

# Keyword search across all API cities
python src/main.py --keyword solar --all --start 2025-01-20 --end 2025-01-27

# With concurrency tuning
python src/main.py --keyword solar --all --start 2025-01-01 --end 2025-01-31 \
  --concurrency-api 10 --concurrency-browser 3 --max-cities 50

# Via INPUT.json
echo '{"city":"Dallas","state":"TX","startDate":"2025-01-01","endDate":"2025-01-31"}' > INPUT.json
python src/main.py

Output is saved to output/<city>_permits.json.

Architecture

src/
├── main.py           Apify entry point — reads input, routes, pushes results
├── router.py         City → platform routing + scraper adapters
├── normalize.py      Standardizes raw output to common 14-field schema
├── accela_scraper.py      Playwright — 163 cities (keyword: form Description field)
├── energov_scraper.py     Playwright + httpx — 37 cities
├── socrata_scraper.py     httpx REST — NYC, LA, Chicago, Seattle, NOLA, more (keyword: $q)
├── arcgis_scraper.py      httpx REST — DC, Nashville, Minneapolis, Baltimore, more (keyword: WHERE LIKE)
├── phoenix_scraper.py     httpx CSV export — Phoenix, AZ
├── portland_scraper.py    httpx ArcGIS MapServer — Portland, OR
├── dc_scraper.py          httpx DCGIS multi-layer — Washington, DC
└── <city>_scraper.py      70+ city-specific scrapers
data/
└── cities_discovered.json    248 supported US cities with platform + portal URL

Concurrency model:

• API scrapers (Socrata, ArcGIS, httpx): up to 8 parallel by default
• Browser scrapers (Accela, EnerGov): up to 3 parallel (RAM-limited, ~300MB each)
• Results stream to the dataset as each city completes — no waiting for all cities

Support & City Requests

Need a city that isn't listed? Email daniel@paxiq.com with the city name and state — new cities are added regularly and most can be turned around quickly.

Notes

• Data is live — pulled directly from city permit portals on each run, not from a cached database. Results are always current as of the run time.
• Playwright scrapers (Accela, EnerGov) run headless Chromium — slower but handle JS-heavy portals. Keyword search on Accela uses the portal's own Description field for server-side filtering.
• API scrapers (Socrata, ArcGIS) push keyword filters to the server — only matching records are transferred.
• maxPermits=0 means no limit — use with caution on large date ranges for major cities.
• Some fields (contractor, owner, value) are not available from all city portals.