September 30, 2026
This report is a direct read of the City of Los Angeles building permit record: every permit issued from January 2020 through September 19, 2026, filtered to residential work and grouped by year and community plan area. It is published with the underlying data, so the figures can be checked, reused, or extended. Nothing here is a forecast. Where a number invites an explanation, the possible readings are listed rather than resolved.
The Dataset
- Source: City of Los Angeles open data, "Building and Safety — Building Permits Issued from 2020 to Present" (dataset
pi9x-tg5x), extracted September 30, 2026. - Coverage: 414,950 permit records, City of Los Angeles only. Neighboring cities and unincorporated county areas are not included.
- Comparison window: every year is cut to January 1 – September 19. 2026 is incomplete, and the cutoff sits a week and a half before extraction so late-filed permits have time to appear — otherwise the current year would be undercounted against settled prior years. Full-year 2020–2025 totals are higher.
- Geography: 43 community plan areas, the City's own planning geography.
- "New house" means a
Bldg-Newpermit with the use Dwelling – Single Family. This distinction matters: the broader "1 or 2 Family Dwelling" category also contains ADUs, garages, patio covers, carports and storage buildings, and counting those would roughly triple the totals below. - Valuation is declared construction value stated on the permit for fee purposes. It is not a market price, not land, and generally not the finished cost of a luxury build. It is useful for comparison between years and areas, not as a cost estimate.
Finding 1: New House Permits Are at a Seven-Year High
Through September 19, 2026, the City issued 1,202 permits for new single-family houses — more than any equivalent period since 2020, and 79% above the 2024 low of 672.
Finding 2: Two-Thirds of Them Are in One Area
Brentwood – Pacific Palisades accounts for 62.6% of every new house permit issued citywide in 2026, up from 5.5% in 2024. In raw counts that area went from 37 permits in 2024 to 278 in 2025 and 752 in 2026.
Finding 3: Without That Area, Permits Are at a Seven-Year Low
Removing Brentwood – Pacific Palisades from the citywide total reverses the trend. The rest of Los Angeles issued 450 new house permits in 2026 to date, against 653 in 2025, 635 in 2024 and 934 at the 2022 peak — a 52% decline from that peak and the lowest figure in the seven-year window.
The same dataset therefore supports two headlines at once: a record year for new houses, and the weakest year on record for new houses outside a single rebuilding area. Both are accurate.
Finding 4: ADUs Now Outnumber New Houses
Accessory dwelling units passed new houses in 2022 and have stayed ahead. In 2026 to date the City permitted 1,357 ADUs against 1,202 new houses. Outside Brentwood – Pacific Palisades the ratio is 2.7 ADUs for every new house.
— new single-family houses - - accessory dwelling units (ADUs)
Finding 5: Declared Values Are Rising Faster Than Volume
Average declared construction value per new house permit rose from $467,871 in 2024 to $664,108 in 2026, a 42% increase. Total declared value for new houses reached $798M, against $314M in 2024.
Renovation work held steady over the same period: 25,688 alteration and addition permits on one- and two-family dwellings in 2026 to date, close to the 27,177 issued in 2024, carrying $686M in declared value.
The Numbers
| Year (Jan 1 – Sep 19) | New houses | Declared value | Avg per house | ADUs | Alterations & additions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 749 | $335M | $447,170 | 388 | 18,574 |
| 2021 | 793 | $401M | $505,863 | 657 | 21,267 |
| 2022 | 993 | $486M | $489,510 | 1,204 | 24,913 |
| 2023 | 839 | $383M | $457,018 | 1,131 | 25,821 |
| 2024 | 672 | $314M | $467,871 | 1,128 | 27,177 |
| 2025 | 930 | $456M | $489,889 | 1,343 | 25,825 |
| 2026 | 1,202 | $798M | $664,108 | 1,357 | 25,688 |
| Community plan area | Houses 2024 | Houses 2025 | Houses 2026 | Avg declared value 2026 | ADUs 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brentwood - Pacific Palisades | 37 | 278 | 752 | $817,165 | 125 |
| Northeast Los Angeles | 63 | 37 | 42 | $328,992 | 108 |
| Hollywood | 23 | 33 | 36 | $400,548 | 44 |
| West Los Angeles | 16 | 20 | 27 | $573,295 | 26 |
| Encino - Tarzana | 33 | 35 | 26 | $659,232 | 29 |
| Silver Lake - Echo Park - Elysian Valley | 27 | 12 | 26 | $362,966 | 23 |
| Van Nuys - North Sherman Oaks | 74 | 30 | 26 | $234,115 | 76 |
| Canoga Park-West Hills-Winnetka-Woodland Hills | 23 | 30 | 23 | $437,728 | 62 |
| Sherman Oaks-Studio City-Toluca Lake-Cahuenga Pass | 46 | 35 | 22 | $448,865 | 15 |
| North Hollywood - Valley Village | 29 | 27 | 19 | $237,333 | 67 |
| Southeast Los Angeles | 18 | 24 | 18 | $216,788 | 70 |
| Bel Air - Beverly Crest | 10 | 19 | 14 | $2,170,000 | 4 |
Possible Readings
The data describes what was permitted. It does not explain why, and several explanations fit the same numbers:
- On the concentration. The Brentwood – Pacific Palisades surge follows the January 2025 fires, and its timing is consistent with rebuilding. The dataset does not label a permit as a rebuild, so the overlap is inferred from timing and geography, not recorded.
- On the decline elsewhere. Fewer new house permits outside that area could reflect financing costs, land scarcity, owners choosing to add rather than replace, capacity absorbed by rebuild work, or slower plan check. The permit record cannot distinguish between them.
- On rising declared values. Higher averages may reflect larger houses, construction cost inflation, a shift in which neighborhoods are building, or simply more accurate declarations. Note that the rebuilding area carries an average well above the citywide figure, which alone pulls the average up.
- On the ADU ratio. ADUs outnumbering new houses is consistent with added density on existing lots, but the dataset counts permits, not completions, and a permit is not a finished unit.
Opportunity Spotlight
Read as a map of activity rather than a verdict, a few patterns stand out:
- Areas where new construction has thinned sharply. Measured against their 2022 peaks, Chatsworth – Porter Ranch fell from 146 new house permits to 11, and Wilmington – Harbor City from 104 to 7. Thin permit volume can mean weak demand — or less competition for the builders and owners still active there.
- Areas where ADUs dominate. Several San Fernando Valley plan areas issued roughly three times as many ADU permits as new houses in 2026, a different kind of construction market operating on the same parcels.
- The valuation spread. Average declared value per new house in 2026 runs from roughly $216,000 in some areas to over $2.1 million in Bel Air – Beverly Crest, on the same permit form and the same city code.
Method
Figures come from Socrata queries against dataset pi9x-tg5x on data.lacity.org. New houses are permit_type = 'Bldg-New' with use_desc = 'Dwelling - Single Family'; ADUs use the same permit type with use_desc = 'Accessory Dwelling Unit'; renovation is Bldg-Alter/Repair and Bldg-Addition on permit_sub_type = '1 or 2 Family Dwelling'. Every year is filtered to January 1 – September 19 so partial-year 2026 compares like with like. Declared valuation is summed from the permit's valuation field. Counts are permits issued, not housing units completed, and one project can generate several permits.
Download the Data
The aggregated data behind this report is published for reuse:
- citywide-by-year.csv — new houses, ADUs, renovation permits and declared values, 2020–2026
- by-community-plan-area.csv — the same measures for all 43 community plan areas
- permit-data.json — both tables as JSON, with source and method metadata
Attribution to Blackbriar Development and to the City of Los Angeles open data portal is appreciated. The underlying records are public; the aggregation is ours.
How Blackbriar Uses This
Blackbriar Development reads the permit record before committing to a site, because activity, declared values and approval patterns in a specific plan area say more about a project's risk than citywide averages do. Our pre-construction process pairs that with the parcel-level checks — zone, slope, hazard overlays and permit history — set out in our 2026 Los Angeles Lot Due Diligence Report. Our full-service approach carries it through design, permitting and construction.
If you are weighing a site or a rebuild in Los Angeles, see our recent work or start a conversation.
FAQ
How many new homes were permitted in Los Angeles in 2026?
The City issued 1,202 permits for new single-family houses between January 1 and September 19, 2026, plus 1,357 ADU permits. Both counts are permits issued, not completed homes.
Which Los Angeles neighborhood is building the most new houses?
Brentwood – Pacific Palisades, by a wide margin: 752 new house permits in 2026 to date, 62.6% of the citywide total, against 37 permits and 5.5% in 2024.
Is new home construction in Los Angeles rising or falling?
Both, depending on the geography. Citywide permits are at a seven-year high at 1,202. Excluding Brentwood – Pacific Palisades, the rest of the city issued 450 — the lowest in the same seven-year window.
What does "valuation" mean on a Los Angeles building permit?
It is the construction value declared on the permit application, used to calculate fees. It excludes land, often excludes design and soft costs, and is not a market value or a finished build cost. It is comparable across years and areas, but should not be read as what a house costs to build.
Can I reuse this data?
Yes. The source records are public City of Los Angeles data, and the aggregated CSV and JSON files are linked above for download.