Home Reno Permits

[Tony Murphy]

So I have a random question. I'm a teacher and I purchased my first duplex over the summer. One of my tenants is being relocated for work and she gave me very early notice that they're going to be moving on July 1st and I'll be on summer break then. In Mass (and I think other states) only owner-occupants can pull permits for renos but I want to put vinyl siding up myself (did it only my primary several years ago.) I wanted to know if I moved in temporarily for the amount of time required to finish the project (let's say 1-2 weeks,) would I be able to pull a permit? It would save me almost $5,000 but I didn't know if there were time requirements. The building inspector in my town is a complete a** and refused to answer my question either way. Anyone ever done this?

[Matt Devincenzo]

In short, No it won't work. Unfortunately it is what it is, and I've been in your shoes before with wanting to do things myself.

What I've done for some jobs like that is had a GC I know pull permits for $300-500, then I or a handyman I use that the GC knows and knows he does good work did the repairs and had it inspected. You can probably find one that would be willing to do that, he may want to inspect prior to the actual building inspector coming out just to be sure that you did it right.