I thought of a better reason than resale to have proper permits: to protect your home owner's insurance. Should something ever happen to a renovation area that was not properly permitted and you have to make a claim, they most likely won't pay.

I find pulling permits a bit of a stress reliever, knowing someone is coming to inspect the contractor's work and making sure things are to code;)

Get the permits for resale reasons. This is also a great way to have the contractors work reviewed by a third party.

218, you definitely want to protect your investment by having the work inspected by a third party. Some people try to avoid the "hassle" or expense but it's never cost effective in the end. Good luck with your project!

We are getting ready to remodel our bathroom (moving shower, vanity, etc). It will a decent sized job and we want permits. A concern from the contractors is how long it takes and if our finished basement didn't have permits we could be responsible for bringing that up to code if needed. The basement was done by the previous home owner. Is there anyway to see if permits were pulled for our basement anonymously? I don't want to raise any red flags with the permit office but want to go in prepared. What are the chances the permit office will check the rest of the house when we are only having the bathroom permits pulled? ...questions from a first time home owner and remodeler. Thanks!

Hi Melissa,
Unfortunately I don't know if there is any way to find out about previous permits anonymously. My husband and I (first-time home owners) have been in the thick of a kitchen remodel for two months now, and permits have been a frustrating part of the ordeal. The last owners told us that the additions (dining room and second story bedroom) they made were permitted, though we've never verified that. With our current kitchen remodel we knew we wanted to get a permit. WIthout getting into a long convoluted story, I would strongly suggest that before any permits are pulled (and especially before any demolition) you (or ideally your contractor) inspect any hidden areas, like the attic. We had a support beam issue that our contractor was over confident about and ended up costing us about 4 weeks of delays (without a kitchen or progress) involving special permitting, etc.
As far as the permit inspector checking in to other areas of the house. The only thing outside the kitchen the inspector mentioned was smoke alarms (he hadn't even looked around the house but they're big on smoke alarms). We live in a city with highly nit-picky inspectors (smoke alarms not being nit-picky). Hopefully your process goes smoother!