Building Permit Processing

Permit decisions are published at the Lupapiste service some days after the decision was issued. When necessary, the permit decision is sent to the applicant or other recipient stated in the application by mail. The letter also contains appeal instructions.

The municipality of Sipoo Construction Supervision Department provides service via email and telephone. Our services are available in two languages, Finnish and Swedish. We recommend that the contact person assigned to your construction project is your principal designer or architect, and that they speak either Finnish or Swedish fluently.

The builder may also apply for a right to begin construction before the permit is legally valid. This is done at the same time as the actual permit application is submitted by writing this request in the project prescription on Lupapiste.

Construction Supervision has the right to extend a permit for a maximum of two years in order to give the applicant time to begin the actual construction work. A prerequisite for extension is that the legal grounds for building the construction or carrying out other action stated in the permit are still valid. To complete a construction already started, the permit may be extended for a maximum of three years and a minimum of six months at a time. An application for permit extension has to be submitted before the date the permit expires.

Extensions are applied either at Lupapiste, or by filling in a form. Whenever the extension application is submitted at Lupapiste, it is necessary to state the requested time clearly in years, that is, for how many years the applicant wishes the permit to be extended. You must also attach a short report on the project’s current situation.

The municipal Construction and Environment Committee grants permits for construction of buildings that exceed an area of 1.500 square metres, and for any residential buildings with more than two apartments. Construction Supervision officers decide on granting other building permits, action permits, demolition permits and landscaping permits.

The construction may only begin after the building permit is legally valid, unless the applicant has applied for a right to begin construction and deposited a security for it (right to begin construction = the applicant may start building after receiving a building permit before the permit has been declared legally valid). Legal validity means that the complaint period has expired and no complaints have been submitted regarding the permit decision. The complaint period for building permits is usually either 14 or 30 days.

Permit decisions are often combined with specific conditions and regulations the applicant has to follow.