Washington requires contractors to register with the Department of Labor & Industries (L&I); electricians hold a separate L&I electrical contractor license and elevator and stairlift installers an elevator contractor license.
80% of the 1,220 firms on the Seattle permit file match an active license in the Washington L&I contractor license data file. Our match can miss a firm that files under another name, so a missing match is a reason to check, not a finding.
Ask the contractor for the license number and look it up at Washington L&I contractor lookup. How to check a contractor's license in Washington →
The middle value recorded on this contractor's matching permits. It's a permit value, not a quote or the final price. Ask for a written estimate.
Matching Seattle permits in the most recent year of our data. It shows recent recorded activity here, not every job the company did.
For contractors with at least 5 permits a year or more old, the share the city completed or closed, adjusted for permit age. Permits that expire without a final count against it. A permit can stay open because of paperwork or timing, so this isn't a workmanship grade.
How long their permits take from issue to the city's completion date, compared with other Seattle contractors in the trade. Shown for firms with 10+ permits.
Matched by name against the Washington L&I contractor license data file. Name matching can miss a license, so always check the number yourself.
About the ranking: The score combines how much of this exact work a contractor has on record, how often their older permits reached completion (where we can measure it), how well their usual job size matches your budget, how recently they've been active, and how much of their work is near you. A measure we can't calculate is left out rather than guessed, and a thin record pulls the score toward the middle. A contractor whose matched license has a problem is listed after everyone else. You set the weights with the sliders on every list.
Seattle specifics: Seattle's building permits name a contractor on only about 1 in 100 residential permits for new homes, additions, remodels and demolition, so there are no general-contractor or remodel rankings; the only building work ranked is re-roofing, which is named on nearly every permit. Plumbing permits are issued by Public Health – Seattle & King County, not the city, so there is no plumbing list. Furnace and heat-pump work follow the city's own permit split, so a ducted heat-pump job often shows the same firm under both trades. Permits carry no state registration number, so firms are matched to L&I by business name; about 4% of permits belong to firms with no match. Residential here is the city's Single Family/Duplex class, which includes townhouses and condo units. Locations are by ZIP code only.
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The numbers: Seattle permit statistics · How long permits take in Seattle
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