Dataset · Demographics
Census Building Permits
Available permits
The Census Building Permits Survey: housing units authorized by building permit in the calendar year, from the metro-area December year-to-date file.
- Publisher
- U.S. Census Bureau
- Category
- Demographics
- Period
- 2025 calendar year
- Refresh cadence
- Annual (release expected in February)
- Measures
- 1
- Licence
- Public domain (U.S. federal government work)
Source
| Fact | Value |
|---|---|
| Publisher | U.S. Census Bureau |
| Product | Building Permits Survey (annual housing units authorized) |
| Source | https://www.census.gov/construction/bps/ (opens in a new tab) |
| Category | Demographics |
| Period | 2025 calendar year |
| Refresh cadence | Annual (release expected in February) |
| Geographies | Metro and micro area, as published (already at metro grain). |
| Availability | Available |
| Cadastre key | permits |
Licence and attribution
| Fact | Value |
|---|---|
| Licence | Public domain (U.S. federal government work) |
| Terms | https://www.census.gov/data/developers/about/terms-of-service.html (opens in a new tab) |
| Register status | Production approved; licence open |
| Allowed uses | evaluation, internal, public_display, derived_analytics, redistribution, bulk_export, public_geometry, api |
This source requires no credit line beyond naming the publisher. Cite it as U.S. Census Bureau, Building Permits Survey (annual housing units authorized).
Measures
The key is the measure's identifier in Cadastre. A measure stored for the metro itself is read as stored; Rule from counties is how a metro is assembled from its counties where it is not (see Methodology).
| Key | Label | Unit | Rule from counties |
|---|---|---|---|
housing_permits | Housing permits | housing units per year | sum over member counties |
Known gaps and caveats
- Residential permits only: it is not a count of all construction or all development activity.