The Davis Square Community

Same with a Sink according the Inspector I talked with down at IDS, you have to hire a licensed plumber. I am sure that their electrical and plumbing contractor buddies can see the importance and value of such regulations... I am trying to figure out how much things would cost if I were a model citizen... ( and a informal poll on how people actually do this...)

Edited Date: 2012-09-28 08:33 pm (UTC)

From:

vibrantabyss.livejournal.com

+1, and I know both electricians and contractors who are utterly anal about permits who have done that sort of work in Somerville in the last decade w/o pulling permits. OP, do you know if this is this a new(ish) city ordinance?

From:

Not totally sure, I think they have a lot of discretion on what is code or not up to code and when it is enforced. Not sure about how it relates to being a city ordinance. Electrical code for instance is written by the State but each town chooses things like when you have to come up to a current code and who can do what sort of work. See: http://www.diychatroom.com/f18/can-homeowner-perform-electrical-work-ma-15677/

Edited Date: 2012-09-28 08:44 pm (UTC)

From:

vibrantabyss.livejournal.com

I wonder if towns are actually overstepping their bounds and expecting not be to challenged, given the flurry of information in that link. Methinks I'll have a chat with a couple of my guys over the next week and see if the electricians and contractors agree with eachother and/or the town.

From:

mzrowan.livejournal.com

I've also had a lot of similar work to that done in Somerville and have never had a contractor mention pulling a permit for something that simple.

From:

lbmango.livejournal.com

First: IANAL.

But isn't this a sort of permission vs forgiveness sort of thing? If you're going to do this yourself to your own house, who's going to turn you in to the permit police?

If you're getting an electrician, shouldn't they deal with this for you? (and charge you) Or is the question "How much should an electrician be charging me for this permit thingee?"?

Finally: IANAL.

From:

dphilli1.livejournal.com

What I was told by a licensed electrician (for medford at least) is that homeowners can do whatever they want as long as it doesn't involve creating new infrastructure (wiring, plumbing). Anything inside the walls requires a licensed contractor

From:

This is similar to what I was told by my electrician. I don't know if it was state or city specific, but he stated that a homeowner can do electrical (such as a fan/light) but not plumbing (not even changing a faucet). That being said, I know the permit for our whole house rewire was $200. I would imagine a ceiling fan would be much less. (I am in Cambridge)

From:

zdenka

OT: I love your icon.

From:

Where did you get this info about a permit and electrician? I'm not sure it's actually right. I think it's a little misinformed.

If you are an owner-occupier, you may do work to your own house. If you are working on a rental property, then you have to have a licensed electrician.

The logic on the license requirement stands that you can take responsibility for your own safety, but you're not allowed to put tenants at risk; or put another way, you are presumed to know how your own house was repaired (and do due diligence when purchasing) but the City has an interest in ensuring that renters --who are generally not in a position to check the repair history of a property-- can trust their house was repaired safely.

I could be wrong about this, but I'm pretty sure that's how it goes.
If you are a renter, your landlord should be having an electrician do this. The licensed electrician is allowed to hire assistants, but she has to be on the job herself if the assistants are not themselves licensed.

And no, simple electrical repairs do not have to be inspected, and certain work that does not represent a change in the electrics do not require a permit. Our electrician pulled permits to pull in more power to the house, and to break out a common-meter as required by law for shared hallways, but the electrician did not pull a permit to re-place the ancient ceiling wires with new material.

Swapping out fixtures we did ourselves. We had the electrician put a new box in the ceiling because in our old house there had never been boxes. then we went and bought a ceiling fan and put it up ourselves. Given that our electrician is way on the up-and-up and always pulls permits for larger jobs in our house, and was happy to do the fan this way, I assume that's legit.

Edited Date: 2012-09-28 11:19 pm (UTC)

From:

We are in the process of taking over our entire two-family as our family is growing and we need the space. The tenants apartment had drop ceilings which we are removing ( along with other work like adding replacement windows and painting).

I wanted to find out which permits were needed for some of the work and they asked if I was doing any electrical or plumbing. I explained that I was taking out drop ceilings and would need to move some light fixtures but not doing any plumbing..When they told me that I would need a licensed electrician and a permit I was surprised. Since I was also thinking about doing some plumbing later.. I asked specifically what a homeowner could do in Somerville, if they could replace a ceiling fan or change a sink. They said I would need a permit and a licensed plumber\electrician for that.. ..

Perhaps I should convert my home back to a legal single family? They did not volunteer whether or not that would make a difference... Does anyone know what is required to do that? Would it make a difference? Would my taxes go down as well? I am wondering if 10 people called ISD and asked the same questions about electrical and plumbing permits if they would all get consistent answers?

I prefer doing a lot of this stuff myself, not just to save money but because the few times that I have called "Professionals" in emergency situations I had shoddy work done that I thought was going to be permitted \ inspected... It seems like the developers or licensed contractors don't have to get things inspected. We called PANN Home services several years ago when we had a leaking pipe over our tenants Bathroom. I knew their prices were high, but I wanted quality work done fast, We ended up getting some kid in training that had to call the master plumber on the phone to be directed on what to do. It was very long process they charged a lot of money. When sears told me I had to pay for permit to get a water heater installed I thought it would be done right, Instead there was no inspection and the water heater looked like the leaning tower of Pisa.. So what was the permit for?

Edited Date: 2012-09-29 04:30 am (UTC)

From:

I've had similar experience with PANN: overpriced and not particularly good work and sending unqualified people out to the job (or shady ones who told me to decline the work then hire them separately). Sears just told me it would cost more to fix my stove than to replace it, which was annoying because it was only a striker not firing. (We opted for a 50cent box of matches). These days I only use plumbers/electricians who are sole-proprietors, or maybe in a group of up to 3 or maybe 4 max in a company.

As for converting from 2-to-1 family I'd say check w/ a real estate lawyer. Be careful with that one. If you have a mortgage, it might not be permitted in the terms of it because it might lower the re-sale value (makes it much harder to flip to condos). There are all kinds of rules that change depending on how many families the house is. Plus I'm pretty sure you can never change it back. We're figuring that some day we'll want to retire down to our first floor and rent the upper levels out when we get older. For us, we have to worry about the 2-fam to 3-fam distinction, because at 3-fam there are new laws regarding sprinklers

If it's a two family there are a lot of energy loans as such that at per unit, but you can get in trouble if you falsely declare multi-family.

By the way, if you get shoddy work done, you can complain to inspectional services and might get the license pulled. PANN definitely is in need of having some inspectors come down on their asses.

From:

Wait a sec. You called to ask which permits were necessary and didn't ask how much they cost when they told you what was needed? And then you posted to LJ to ask instead of calling back?

Was this really a question to the community, or just a complaint masquerading as a question?

Edited Date: 2012-09-29 05:00 am (UTC)

From:

I called back, I also called 311 about converting my home and they told me that I would have to talk to zoning and planning but that everyone had gone home already. This was before I left work on Friday. My electrician estimated the cost of permits for some work which includes light fixtures. Looking forward I wanted to know what to expect if I need a permit for one fixture or sink, what the costs were, whether other people have had experience with this, etc.. . I am interested to know how others do this sort of thing, and what kind of experiences they have had. I would be lying if I did not say that I was frustrated with the process so you could say that is a question and complain and a discussion. No masquerading needed.

Edited Date: 2012-09-29 12:14 pm (UTC)

From:

starphire.livejournal.com

You didn't say if there is an *existing* light fixture where you intend to put in the ceiling fan, so perhaps there is new wiring through walls and ceiling involved? Though that doesn't necessarily mean a permit is always required, as others have noted, it's certainly a lot more for a homeowner to tackle themselves.

Also, if you DO have an existing light fixture there, and your home is typical for this area (i.e. "old"), there is a strong possibility that installing a ceiling fan will require more work than merely swapping out a fixture for a fan with just a few screws and wire nuts.
From what I've seen, most old houses around here still have old wiring in the ceiling, usually with small cast-iron mounts for the fixture that don't fit (and cannot safely support the weight of) a ceiling fan. In those cases, you'll need to install a new junction box that's properly supported between two ceiling joists. If there's unfinished attic space above, that's easier than if there's another floor overhead. Though there are retrofit devices specially designed to fit into such places, intended as ceiling fan mounts; you have to enlarge the hole to install them, though.

From:

When we first went to put in ceiling fans, I took out an overhead fixture and found a mess of paper-insulated wires and an old iron fitting. So I hired an electrician to put a box in so I could attach to that. The electrician came in, took a look and said "nope. won't put a box there. Don't put your light back either. We have to pull out those wires before you attach anything." Since I couldn't do that right away, the fix was to put arc-fault breakers in until we could. I am so grateful to have an electrician who cares about our lives.

From:

larksdream

Can you share their name?

From:

I hope it's okay for me to add this information here.

We recently (and currently) are renovating our home in North Cambridge and have had excellent experiences with our plumber and electrician.

Our electrician, Lars, has rewired the entire house, bringing it up to code, adding switches, overhead lights, sockets, fans, and wired in CO2/fire detectors and pulling a subpanel to the third floor. He was one of the only electricians we interviewed who was willing to snake the wires. Since we weren't gutting everything, we didn't really want to pull down all the ceilings like some electricians wanted. He has been friendly, easy to communicate with, and very upfront about all costs and time frames.
Lars S. Fossel
Licensed Electrician
102 Palfrey St.
Watertown, Ma 02472
C (617) 224-2594
lfossel@comcast.net

Our plumber is local to Teele Square (and his wife frequents DSLJ). Jamie has been absolutely awesome to work with. He did some original plumbing fixes when we bought the place, and has now also converted our heating system from steam/radiators to hot water/baseboards. He also did the plumbing for our bathroom gutting and kitchen updating (including moving the gas line for the stove). He was always timely, did exactly what he said he was going to do for the cost he quoted, and was patient while working with our GC. I am sure he will be our plumber from now on.
3) James Dillon, Owner
Dillon Plumbing & Heating
(617)319-5898
dillonplumbing@gmail.com

I would whole heartedly recommend either.

From:

Thanks, That is great information. How did you decided to rewire the entire house?

From:

We knew when we bought the place that updating the electrical was going to be needed. There was essentially no electricity on third floor, no overhead lights in half the rooms, very old sockets that were not three pronged, etc. It was not old knob and tube, but only about one step up from that (I think my husband said BMX or Romax or something?). For both safety and convenience we decided having the whole house updated was the best course. I think it has been well worth the cost, and has made many of the rooms more livable.

From:

antimony.livejournal.com

Romex, FYI.

Also, for the original poster: we like the person we've had do some work on our furnace and some plumbing (which he does, although it's not their primary business): http://peterneedhamelectrical.net/

From:

Thanks!

yeah, hubby said it was BX and is all updated to Romex now.

From:

jamiesquared.livejournal.com

I was poking around DS since I haven't been on lately and this thread caught my eye. Glad I read it because I saw this post...I will have to tell him tonight, thanks for the recommendation :)

From: