Portland building permit search: PortlandMaps, statuses and old records

Where Portland permits live

This covers the City of Portland. Gresham, Beaverton, Lake Oswego and the rest of the metro area run their own permit offices.

How to look up the permits on a Portland address

1. Go to portlandmaps.com and type the address in the search bar. If it fails, the City suggests the house number and street without "St" or "Ave".
2. On the property summary, select Permits & Zoning, then Permits. Use Pop Out to widen the list.
3. Open each application number. Electrical, mechanical and plumbing permits are filed apart from the building permit, so one remodel usually shows several.
4. Read the status and open Activity for the inspection history.
5. For plans from 2012 onward, open the Documents bar. The City says viewing them needs a free City of Portland account.

What the statuses mean

These are the main statuses in the City's permit file and how our pages count them:

A permit that expired or was cancelled is not counted as finished even when the file gives it a closing date. Of the permits issued October 2024 to September 2025, 93.3% had finished, 5.2% were still open and 1.5% had expired by our 18 October 2026 snapshot.

When the record is not online

Portland Permitting & Development's public records page says plans and applications for permits "issued from June 1, 2012, through December 2023 are available for free on Portland Maps", and that most permits issued after December 2023 are not yet online in that form. For those, and for anything issued before 1 June 2012, file a request through the City's public records portal. The page says: "We require a minimum records request fee of $8 per address", charged when you submit, with extra fees estimated for complex histories, and that "it could take two weeks or more to fulfill requests for building permit records" (read 24 October 2026).

What our Portland pages add

PortlandMaps answers "what was permitted at this address". Our Portland page answers "what gets built here, and how fast the City signs it off":

67% of the 76,879 permits issued October 2024 to September 2026 were on homes. Roofing counts are low (150 permits) because a re-roof with no structural work needs no permit in Portland. The permit statistics page has the year, month and season breakdown, how long a permit takes has the middle-half ranges, permits by ZIP code shows where the work is (97219 led with 5,377 permits in the same window), and browse permits lists the rows without owner names or street addresses. To check a contractor's license, use How to check a contractor's license in Oregon.

What this does not tell you

The City's file names no contractor, so our pages show counts, not firm rankings. Job value is declared on building permits only, not on electrical, mechanical or plumbing permits. A Final status means the City passed the work, not what it cost.