What do these permits involve in Albuquerque?

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Zoning Certificate

The City's own Business License FAQ page separately states that 'zoning approval' is required before a Business License is issued, but does not state whether that sign-off requires purchasing this specific $200 Zoning Certificate product or can instead be confirmed administratively during the license review itself. Recorded here as a real, confirmed-fee product a business can obtain, rather than asserted as a mandatory universal prerequisite.

Business License

Effective July 1, 2025, this Business License replaced the City's former 'Business Registration' — Council Bill O-24-60 repealed the old ordinance specifically to add teeth: the prior registration's only penalty was a one-time $10 late fee (still the figure shown on the Planning Department's own General Fee Schedule PDF, last updated 1/17/2025 — a snapshot of the outgoing regime rather than the current one), while the License carries a $10-per-calendar-day delinquency fee and a $100/day civil fine for operating without one. The fee itself started at $35 when the ordinance took effect, but the ordinance allows the City to raise it up to 5% a year; the City's own FAQ page states the first such increase takes effect July 1, 2026, bringing the fee to $36.75 — the figure recorded here, since that date has passed. A business operating more than one location needs a separate license and fee for each. Applicants must submit a current New Mexico Taxation and Revenue Department registration certificate showing the physical business address, and zoning approval is required before a license issues. A separate, identically-named Business License requirement applies to childcare facilities but with the fee itself waived (recorded separately below), and a separate Fire & Life Safety Inspection Fee (also recorded separately below) applies on top of this license fee for most commercial applicants.

Commercial Building Permit & Certificate of Occupancy

The published valuation table itself dates to April 2010, but the Building Safety Division's current fee-information page still describes plan review as 65% of the permit fee — the same figure this decade-old table states — so it is treated here as the operative fee methodology rather than a stale document, with its age disclosed. No separately published Certificate of Occupancy fee, distinct from this permitting and final-inspection process, could be found; the certificate is issued as the closing step of this same process rather than as a separately priced product.

Fire & Life Safety Inspection Fee (Business License)

This fee, and its four size bands, are stated identically in two independently published City documents — the Planning Department's own Business License FAQ page and Albuquerque Fire Rescue's own Chapter 83 fee schedule. It is separate from, and additional to, the Business License fee itself, and covers the Fire Marshal's initial and annual inspection of the business premises. Non-profit organizations are expressly subject to this fee as well (Chapter 83, §8302.2), and Chapter 83 — read here in full — contains no exemption of any kind for a state-licensed childcare facility. The Business License fee exemption for such a facility (recorded separately below) is textually scoped to 'the fee' meaning the license fee itself, in a sentence separate from the FAQ page's mention of this inspection fee, so a state-licensed childcare facility still owes this Fire & Life Safety Fee.

Fire Inspection Fee — New Construction/Remodel

This is a distinct, one-time fee for new buildings, tenant improvements and remodels — separate from the recurring Fire & Life Safety Inspection Fee an existing business pays annually with its Business License, and separate from any fire-related plan-review component folded into the Commercial Building Permit. A re-inspection, required whenever a first re-inspection still finds incomplete work or uncorrected violations, is a flat $60 per Section 8305, charged for that and every further re-inspection needed.

Permit	Issuing agency	Fee	Renews	Last checked
Zoning Certificateonly if it applies to you	City of Albuquerque Planning Department, Development Review Services / Code Enforcement	$200 flat, per request	one-time, per request	2026-09-11
Business License	City of Albuquerque Planning Department, Business Licensing Section	$36.75 annual, per location	annual — renews each year; renewal must be filed no later than 10 days before the current license's expiration date (renewal may be initiated up to 90 days early)	2026-09-11
Commercial Building Permit & Certificate of Occupancy	City of Albuquerque Planning Department, Building Safety Division	The Building Safety Division's own published table prices a commercial/apartment/public permit starting at $23.50 for the first $800 of construction valuation, rising through a detailed banded table to $1,495.00 at $320,000-$321,000 of valuation. Beyond the published table, the Division computes the fee as $993.75 for the first $100,000 of valuation plus $5.60 for each additional $1,000, then applies a 0.67 commercial multiplier (0.50 for one- and two-family residential work). Plan review is billed separately, at 65% of the calculated permit fee — a figure the Division's current online fee-information page confirms is still the operative method, layered on top of the 2021 edition of the ICC Building Valuation Data for minimum per-square-foot construction values. A zoning review fee of $25 (buildings under 4,000 sq ft) or $45 (4,000 sq ft or more) and a flat $50 hydrology fee apply on top of the permit and plan-review fees.	one-time, per project	2026-09-11
Fire & Life Safety Inspection Fee (Business License)	Albuquerque Fire Rescue, Fire Marshal's Office	$35–$400 annual, banded by the occupied square footage of the business premises — up to 1,500 sq ft $35; 1,501-6,000 sq ft $100; 6,001-12,000 sq ft $250; 12,001 sq ft or more $400	annual, assessed alongside the Business License at initial application and each renewal	2026-09-11
Fire Inspection Fee — New Construction/Remodel	Albuquerque Fire Rescue, Fire Marshal's Office	$10–$400 one-time, banded by occupied square footage under Table 8304.1 — $10 up to 500 sq ft, rising through seven further bands to $400 for 50,001 sq ft or more	one-time, per project	2026-09-11

Business licenses and permits in Albuquerque, New Mexico

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Permits that apply to every type of business in Albuquerque