Austin foundation repair permits: what City records show and what they leave out

Do you need a permit for foundation repair in Austin?

For one- and two-family homes and townhouses of up to three stories, the City of Austin lists a foundation repair that does not exceed 128 square feet as work exempt from a building permit. Its Express Permits page lists foundation repair that does not add more than 128 square feet of impervious cover and says it issues most Express permits in one business day. Before 2019, no more than one permit a year in this study had a description beginning with the word Express; in 2019, 62 did, in 2020, 404, and from January to September 2026, 739 of 760.

The City's residential fee schedule for fiscal year 2026-27 lists a flat fee of $112.76 for Express residential plan review. That fee is separate from what the repair costs. Our Austin cost page lists the City fee items we found and the prices companies publish.

This study covers City of Austin permits only. For San Antonio, Fort Worth and Round Rock, our questions guide covers who pulls the permit and each city's engineer requirement for foundation repair permits.

Does an expired permit mean the repair failed?

The record cannot tell you. It holds a status and dates, with no reason, so an expired permit does not show whether the work was done or how well.

Of the 1,359 expired permits in this study, 935 (68.8%) expired 180 or 181 days after they were issued. The City words its current rule two ways. Its Homeowner's Permit page says: "Once a permit is activated, it expires on the 181st day if the project has not been scheduled nor received an inspection." Its Activating a Permit page says: "Permits will expire 180 days after activation if the City has not performed an on-site inspection (Pass or Fail)." The Homeowner's Permit page adds that a passing inspection extends the expiration date by 180 days. These are the current rules; we did not check the rules in force in earlier years.

The same page says the contractor listed on a permit may be able to reactivate it through the City's online portal.

Expired permits stay with the house. The Homeowner's Permit page says: "As the property owner, you are responsible for addressing all expired permits, including expired permits performed by previous owners."

What the records cannot show

• Work done without a permit.
• Small repairs the City exempts from a building permit, when no permit was issued for them.
• Permits from other cities; the data covers City of Austin permits only.
• Why a permit expired, and whether its work was done or how well.
• What a homeowner paid.
• Exactly what work each permit covered beyond its short description; a few permits that mention the foundation describe other work.
• Where things stand after October 11, 2026: changes to the 157 Active and 3 Pending Permit records may change these figures.

How to use a permit record

• Hiring a company. Ask for the permit number before work starts and look it up yourself. Our questions guide explains who pulls the permit and links Austin's public permit search.
• Comparing companies. Most permits name a contractor company: 96.6% of those issued 2009 to 2020 and 98.3% of those issued since 2024. Our Austin comparison shows, for each listed company, the City permits since 2024 we matched to it, if any, and how many have closed.
• Buying a house. Look up the permits on the property and ask the seller about any marked Expired, since the City holds the owner responsible for them. If a permit expired, ask the seller or the contractor listed on it whether the work was finished and whether the permit can be reactivated.
• Pricing a repair. Leave a permit's reported valuation out of your price comparison, and compare bids priced against the same repair plan.

How we counted

The data is the City of Austin's Issued Construction Permits dataset (3syk-w9eu), published by the Development Services Department on the City's open data portal as public domain and downloaded on October 11, 2026. We selected residential building permits in the Repair work class whose description contains the word foundation; 10,593 records matched.

We left out 192 permits issued before 2009 and 40 issued in October 2026, a month not yet complete. No year before 2009 holds more than 135 permits, and every year from 2009 holds at least 404; we did not check why. That leaves 10,361 permits. Of those, 10,298 are in Austin's full-purpose jurisdiction, 32 in its two-mile extraterritorial jurisdiction, 30 in its limited-purpose area and 1 in Lakeway's extraterritorial jurisdiction; all are kept. Void, withdrawn, cancelled and aborted permits stay in the counts except where a column says otherwise.

Statuses and dates are as of October 11, 2026. The final share of closed permits is Final permits divided by Final plus Expired permits, for all permits together. Percentages are rounded to one decimal place, and dollar figures are nominal.

We compared this download with one taken on October 7, 2026 of permits issued since January 2024. Among permits issued January 2, 2024 through October 6, 2026, none had been added or removed, no valuation had changed, and 11 statuses had changed: 10 from Active to Final and 1 from Active to Expired. The 13 new records were issued October 7 to 9.