In Broward County the city on the address decides where the permit record lives. The county's own permit search lists 31 cities plus unincorporated Broward, and for most addresses inside a city, it is the city's building department that issued the permits. Before you search, know which one you are dealing with.
The county's search: by address, folio or parcel
Broward County's Building Code Division is the permit authority for unincorporated Broward. Its Search for Permit by Address page finds the permits the county itself issued, three ways:
- By address. Enter every field: street number, street name and street type, and pick the city from the list. Leave out any unit or suite number.
- By folio number, in the format shown on the page (for example 0215-01-0130).
- By parcel ID.
The same county site has two more searches worth running on any unincorporated property: Certificates of Use, and Code Compliance & Code Enforcement, which you can search by case, address, folio or parcel.
Inside a city: search the city's own portal
If the address is in one of the cities, that city's building department is usually the one with the record, and each runs its own system. Fort Lauderdale's is LauderBuild, the city's Accela Citizen Access portal. Anyone can use it to search and view the status of a record without creating an account; an account is only needed to apply for permits or track your own.
For the other cities, start at the city's building department page and look for its permit search. If a search in one place comes back empty, try the other before concluding that no permit was ever pulled.
Buying a condo: ask for the building's inspection reports
Condo buyers in Broward have a question to ask that house buyers do not: has the building had its required structural inspections, and what did they find? Two sets of rules cover it.
- The county's Building Safety Inspection Program. Under the Broward County Board of Rules and Appeals Policy 05-05, a building must be inspected once it reaches 25 years from the date its certificate of occupancy was issued, and every 10 years after that, as Hollywood's building department explains. One- and two-family dwellings under 3,500 square feet are exempt, and so are all buildings under 3,500 square feet. Hollywood also notes that the county policy supersedes the state bill known as SB 154.
- Florida's milestone inspection law. Florida Statutes § 553.899 requires a milestone inspection of any condominium or cooperative building three or more habitable stories tall, by December 31 of the year it reaches 30 years of age, or 25 where the local agency requires it, and every 10 years after that. A licensed architect or engineer makes a visual examination first; a second, more invasive phase follows only if the first finds substantial structural deterioration. The law does not apply to one- to four-family dwellings of three or fewer habitable stories.
So before you sign on a condo, ask the association for the most recent inspection report, whether a second phase was required, and what repairs it called for. Those repairs, and how the association plans to pay for them, belong in your decision.
Buying a house
Most single-family homes fall outside both inspection programs. The state law skips one- to four-family dwellings of three or fewer stories, and the county exempts one- and two-family dwellings under 3,500 square feet, though a larger house is not automatically exempt and is worth asking the city about. For most houses, then, the permit history carries the weight. Look for permits on the roof, windows and shutters, and on any addition or enclosed patio, and check that each one was finaled. If the house has work that never appears in either the county's or the city's records, buying a house with unpermitted work explains what you would be taking on.
What Broward County Is Permitting Right Now
Broward is moving the other way from the country. Nationally, house permits are down 3.2% and apartment permits up 6.5%; in Broward, single-family permits are up 13%, from 430 to 486, while multifamily is down 17% to 1,170 units. The county total is down 10%. About 84% of Broward's figure comes from permit offices that reported to the Census Bureau, and the Bureau estimates the rest, so read the smaller numbers as approximate.
Source: US Census Bureau Building Permits Survey, county file, year to date through July 2026 against the same months of 2025. 84.1% of these units were reported directly by permit offices; the rest are Census estimates for offices that did not report.
Looking Up Permits Elsewhere
Every county splits its records differently. How to look up building permits by address covers the method that works anywhere.