What Texas decides, and what your city decides

There is no such thing as a Texas contractor licence for general construction. The state licenses three trades and leaves everything else to the 1,200 or so cities, which is why two towns fifteen minutes apart can charge three times the fee for the same house and want the insurance certificate worded differently.

This page is the part that is the same everywhere. The city pages are the part that is not.

What the state licenses

TDLR puts the electrical rule plainly: anyone who performs, or offers to perform, non-exempt electrical work in Texas must be licensed, and must perform that work through a licensed electrical contractor. The individual licenses run Apprentice, Residential Wireman, Journeyman, Journeyman Industrial, Journeyman Lineman, Journeyman Sign, Maintenance Electrician and Master Electrician. The business itself holds the Electrical Contractor license, which is the one a city asks to see.

Plumbing sits with a different body entirely, the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners. That split catches people who assume one state agency covers the trades, and it is why a city form asks for a TDLR number on one line and a TSBPE number on another.

What your city decides

Everything that costs money on a given job:

• Whether you register, what it costs and how long it lasts. Some cities run the calendar year, some run twelve months from payment.
• The insurance minimum, and the wording. Certificate holder and additional insured are not the same instruction to your agent.
• The permit fees, which are per square foot in some cities and per valuation band in others.
• Which code editions apply, which decides the inspection.
• How you apply, which is increasingly a portal and increasingly not a form.

Five cities, read directly

Every figure here came off that city’s own published pages or its adopted fee schedule, on 2026-09-17. It is a small sample, and that is the point: these are the ones we have read rather than guessed.

Six years separate Bellaire’s code editions from Humble’s. If you work across the metro, that is the difference between two inspections on the same detail.

The same house, two cities

A 2,000 square foot new residence, building permit only, before plan review and trade permits:

Three times the fee across four cities in the same metropolitan area, for the same house. Then Jersey Village adds $55.65 of processing to every permit on the job and Bellaire adds $44, while Humble and Tomball add none. This is the reason quoting a job from memory across a city line goes wrong.

How to check a city we have not covered

The method, in the order that saves the most time:

1. Find the building or development services page and read how applications are taken. If it says online only, stop looking for a PDF.
2. Find the adopted fee schedule. It is rarely on the permit page. Look for a master fee schedule published with the budget, or a schedule of fees inside the code of ordinances, usually in the administration chapter rather than the building chapter.
3. Read the contractor registration page for the fee, the term and the insurance wording. Certificate holder and additional insured are different instructions.
4. Check the adopted code editions, which are usually on their own page and often out of step with the city next door.
5. Look for the doubling rule. Most Texas cities charge twice the permit fee for work started before the permit is issued, and it is usually one line you can miss.

If you want a city covered here, send the links to its permit pages and its fee schedule: contact@pdfeyes.com. Cities are added when they have been read, not before, which is why this list is short and the numbers on it are real.

Sources, read on 2026-09-17: TDLR Electricians, TDLR Air Conditioning and Refrigeration, Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners, and each city’s own pages and adopted fee schedule, cited on that city’s page. PDFeyes is not affiliated with any authority, and this is not legal advice. See the disclaimer.