What permits do you need to open a auto repair shop in Salt Lake City?

There is no single figure, and any site quoting one is rounding away the part that matters. Of the 14 records listed for a auto repair shop in Salt Lake City, UT, 6 apply to every business of this type and 8 are conditional. Adding every fee on the page together would overstate what most operators pay, because it would include permits they never need.

Of the 6 that always apply, 1 carry a flat fee, coming to $75.00. That is a floor, not a total. 4 of the 14 are charged as a range or a formula set by the issuing agency, and 4 have no fee published at all. The ones that vary:

General Business Licence: A base Commercial licence fee of $193/year (risen from $187 before September 2025), plus $28/year for every full- or part-time employee once the business has more than one. Several specific trades owe a further named-category fee on top — see the individual industry records below.

Building Permit (Commercial): Priced by total project valuation on a stepped table: $54.55 flat up to $500; $54.55 plus $4 per additional $100 (or fraction) from $500.01-$2,000; $114.55 plus $20 per additional $1,000 (or fraction) from $2,000.01-$25,000; $574.55 plus $14 per additional $1,000 from $25,000.01-$50,000; $924.55 plus $10 per additional $1,000 from $50,000.01-$100,000; $1,424.55 plus $8 per additional $1,000 from $100,000.01-$500,000; $4,624.55 plus $7 per additional $1,000 from $500,000.01-$1,000,000; and $8,124.55 plus $5 per additional $1,000 (or fraction) above $1,000,000. A plan review fee of 65% of the building permit fee applies separately.

Sign Permit: Priced on the same valuation-based Building Permit Fee Schedule as the general building permit, plus a plan-checking fee of $0.15 per dollar of the calculated building permit fee (roughly a 15% surcharge) and a $16 inspection tag fee per inspection.

Zoning Verification Letter: $84 filing fee, plus $61 per hour of additional research time if the review extends beyond the first hour.

Permits for a auto repair shop in Salt Lake City, UT come from 7 separate offices: City of Salt Lake City Finance Department, Business Licensing Division, City of Salt Lake City, Department of Community and Neighborhoods, Building Services Division, City of Salt Lake City, Planning Division, Salt Lake City Fire Department, Fire Prevention Bureau, Utah Division of Corporations and Commercial Code, Utah State Tax Commission, Utah Motor Vehicle Enforcement Division. No single office issues them all, which is why an opening means filing in several places rather than one.

• City of Salt Lake City Finance Department, Business Licensing DivisionIssues 2 permits on this page: General Business Licence, Business Licence Add-On — Auto/Truck & Mechanic Related Services451 South State Street, Salt Lake City, UT 84111 · (801) 535-6644www.slc.gov/Finance/business-licensing
• City of Salt Lake City, Department of Community and Neighborhoods, Building Services DivisionIssues 3 permits on this page: Building Permit (Commercial), Sign Permit, Certificate of Occupancy451 South State Street, Salt Lake City, UT 84111 · (801) 535-6000www.slc.gov/buildingservices/building-permits
• City of Salt Lake City, Planning DivisionIssues 1 permit on this page: Zoning Verification Letter451 South State Street, Room 406, Salt Lake City, UT 84111 · (801) 535-7757www.slc.gov/planning/zoning
• Salt Lake City Fire Department, Fire Prevention BureauIssues 1 permit on this page: Hazardous Materials Permit — Body Shop/Garage475 South 300 East, Salt Lake City, UT 84111 · (801) 799-3473fire.slc.gov/salt-lake-city-fire-prevention-bureau
• Utah Division of Corporations and Commercial CodeIssues 4 permits on this page: General Business Licence (not required by Utah), Certificate of Organization (LLC), Articles of Incorporation, Annual Renewal160 East 300 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84111 · (801) 530-4849corporations.utah.gov
• Utah State Tax CommissionIssues 1 permit on this page: Sales and Use Tax Licence210 North 1950 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84134 · (801) 297-2200tax.utah.gov
• Utah Motor Vehicle Enforcement DivisionIssues 2 permits on this page: Automotive Repair Shop Licence (not required by Utah), Motor Vehicle Body Shop Licence210 North 1950 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84134 · (801) 297-2600mved.utah.gov

Mandatory for anyone conducting business — even temporarily — within Salt Lake City's corporate limits, per the Finance Department's own description; the licensing review itself is what confirms zoning, fire-code and building-code compliance rather than a separate stand-alone certificate. A commonly repeated '$100 non-refundable application fee' appears on several third-party small-business sites but does not match the city's own Consolidated Fee Schedule, which is used here instead.

Risen from $73 before September 2025. A body/collision shop that stores flammable or hazardous materials above the fire code's minimum threshold quantities also owes the Fire Prevention Bureau's separate annual hazardous-materials permit recorded below; an ordinary mechanical shop below that threshold owes only this business-licence fee.

Applied for through the Citizen Access Portal, with plans submitted through ProjectDox. Electrical, plumbing and mechanical permits are priced on their own separate tables within the same Consolidated Fee Schedule rather than folded into this figure. New structures, additions, commercial changes of use, and historic-district work should start at the Planning Counter (801-535-7700) before applying.

Starting work before the permit is issued can double the fee, per the same code section. Available as a fillable form on the Building Services applications-forms page.

No fee is published for this certificate anywhere this research could find — Building Services' own page confirms the office issues Certificates of Occupancy and gives a direct contact (801-535-6000), but neither that page nor a section-by-section read of the Community and Neighborhoods portion of the Consolidated Fee Schedule (which otherwise itemizes building, electrical, plumbing, mechanical, fencing and boarding-registration fees individually) names a separate dollar figure for it. It may be folded into the building permit fee already paid rather than charged again; confirm treatment for a specific project directly with Building Services before assuming it is free of charge.

An advisory letter documenting a property's current legal use, whether that use conforms to current zoning, and whether the building can be rebuilt, open permits, or associated variances exist — most often requested by lenders, buyers or appraisers rather than required to open a business. Submitted through the Citizen Access Portal; the Planning Division's own process states a 1-2 day turnaround once a planner is assigned. The Consolidated Fee Schedule prices a similarly-scoped 'Administrative Interpretation' at a slightly lower $81, which this file records as a related but distinct product rather than assuming it is the same fee under a different name.

A named line item on the Fire Prevention Bureau's own hazardous-materials permit table, separate from and in addition to the Business Licence's Auto/Truck & Mechanic Related Services fee recorded above. It applies to a body shop or garage that stores or dispenses flammable/combustible materials (paints, solvents, fuels) above the fire code's minimum threshold quantities; an ordinary mechanical repair shop that stays below those thresholds would not trigger it, though this file could not independently confirm where that line falls for a specific shop — confirm applicability with the Fire Prevention Bureau (801-799-3473).

No fee, because Utah's state-level structure is entity registration rather than business licensing — the Division of Corporations frames the question as whether another unit of government requires registration, not as a licence the state itself grants for the right to operate. A city or county licence is the thing that actually functions as a general business licence for most Utah businesses.

Fifty-nine dollars, the same figure whether the entity is domestic or registering in from out of state. A corporation costs the identical $59 to form.

The same $59 as an LLC, and a nonprofit corporation costs the same again.

Eighteen dollars a year, the same figure for an LLC or a corporation, due in the entity's own anniversary month rather than a single date shared statewide. Missing it is not immediately fatal: the statute gives sixty days from the division's notice to cure before administrative dissolution follows, and reinstating after dissolution costs $54 for an LLC or a corporation. A dissolved entity's name, and any assumed names filed under it, cannot be reused by anyone else for two years afterward.

No fee — the state's own combined business and tax registration form lists a line for the sales and use tax licence alongside every other tax account a business might need, and nowhere on the form does a dollar amount attach to it. Once registered, a business is assigned a filing cycle, monthly, quarterly or annual, and must file on that cycle even in a period with no sales.

No fee, and the line is drawn precisely: a general mechanical repair shop doing oil changes, brakes or engine work needs no state licence at all, while a shop doing collision or body repair does. The motor vehicle enforcement division's complete list of licence categories runs to body shop, crusher, dealer, dismantler, distributor, manufacturer, transporter and salvage buyer, with no category for a plain repair or service shop anywhere in it. See the body shop licence record for the collision-repair side of the boundary.

A hundred and twelve dollars for the licence itself, but the real cost of entry is the $20,000 surety bond every body shop must file on a specific state form before it can operate — tied to the consumer-protection concerns around vehicles that have been in a collision or carry a salvage history, which is why this licence exists at all where an ordinary mechanical repair shop needs none. The application must include a photograph of the shop's sign along with the bond and ownership details, submitted directly to the division.