What if my house has an unpermitted addition and I want to sell?

With older work, the dates come first. Virginia's rule on notices of violation, in the Uniform Statewide Building Code at 13VAC5-63-150, measures a two-year window from the certificate of occupancy, from initial occupancy, or from an approved final inspection.

When violations are discovered more than two years after the certificate of occupancy is issued or the date of initial occupancy, whichever occurred later, or more than two years after the approved final inspection for an alteration or renovation, a notice of violation shall only be issued upon advice from the legal counsel of the locality that action may be taken to compel correction of the violation.

13VAC5-63-150, Uniform Statewide Building Code

Read that carefully for what it does not say. It limits when a notice issues after two years; it does not make the work legal. And it is written around a final inspection, which work done without a permit would not have had. How the window applies to an addition that never had a permit or a final inspection is a question for the building official, and this page does not answer it.

The certificate of occupancy is the other date on file. A new certificate is not required for an addition to an existing Group R-5 building that already has one. Where the building department has no certificate on file, the owner may ask in writing for one to be created, and it issues if there are no current violations of the Virginia Maintenance Code or the Statewide Fire Prevention Code and the occupancy classification has not changed. What that certificate is, and what it does, is in the entry on the certificate of occupancy. Under Va. Code 36-105, a building is not deemed in compliance until the inspecting authority approves it.

The one seller disclosure tied to building code enforcement turns on what the locality has put in writing, so the paper trail matters before the penalties do.

When a violation involves work without a permit, the building official's notice of violation goes to the responsible party. Enforcement on existing buildings is a local choice: Va. Code 36-105 says the local governing body may inspect and enforce the Building Code for existing buildings, occupied or not. Va. Code 36-106 makes a violation a misdemeanor. A conviction carries a fine of not more than $2,500 and a court order to abate or remedy a violation still uncorrected, within six months of conviction unless the court provides otherwise for good cause. Penalties rise with repeat convictions: a third or subsequent offense within 10 years carries jail for up to 10 days, a fine of $5,000 to $10,000 or both. A locality may instead adopt a schedule of civil penalties for specified violations not promptly abated after notice, and designating a violation that way is in lieu of criminal sanctions and, except for a violation resulting in injury to persons, rules out misdemeanor prosecution.

The disclosure that follows a written notice

Va. Code 55.1-706 applies notwithstanding the Disclosure Act's exemptions. An owner of a residential dwelling unit who has actual knowledge of a pending Building Code enforcement action affecting the property's safe, decent, sanitary living conditions, of which the locality notified the owner in writing, has to give a prospective purchaser a written disclosure saying so, on a form the Real Estate Board provides on its website. The same section covers a pending zoning violation not abated within the time set in the written notice or by a court. This one disclosure is separate from the general seller disclosure statement, and whether that statement is required on a given sale is answered in does Virginia require a seller disclosure.