Solar, Roofing and HVAC Leads from Building Permits: A How-To with 30 Days of Real Data
If you sell solar, roofing or HVAC, or sell to the companies that do, building permits are the most honest public signal of where work is happening. I classified 77,044 permits issued from Sep 20 to Oct 19, 2026, across 47 US cities and counties. Here is what the three most-requested trades look like. How the work categories are assigned Cities don't share a permit taxonomy. Austin uses…
Solar, roofing and HVAC leads can be derived from building permits. Examining 77,044 permits issued in 47 US cities from September 20 to October 19, 2026 revealed patterns for each trade. Solar permits were most frequent in New York City (357) and San Diego County (224) with a median value of $39,864 and $21,827 respectively. Roofing led in permit count with Columbus issuing 1,061 permits, generating a median value of $13,702.
Mechanical/Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) permits were the least reliable with many being equipment swaps. For contractors, grouping by contractor name and ranking by permit count can identify active installers. To obtain this data, use the Building Permits Scraper, which is priced at $2 per 1,000 permits.
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