Do I Need a Permit to Build a Patio in Savannah or Chatham County?

If you have a contractor and have picked your pavers, there’s one thing that’s keeping you from moving forward. You want to know if you need to get a permit to build a patio, and what happens if you don’t. Nobody wants to get hit with a stop-work order, a fine, or a completed patio that has to be torn up because the right paperwork wasn’t turned in. It’s a valid thing to worry about. But the good news is that for most backyards around here, the answer is much simpler than most people think it is.

My name is Randy Thompson, and I’m the founder of All-Out Hardscapes LLC. I actually left my career in aerospace to build patios, and over the past ten years, we’ve built more than 150 patios, walkways, and outdoor living spaces all over Savannah and the Coastal Lowcountry, from Wilmington Island to Savannah Quarters and in Effingham County. We are a certified Techo-Pro installer, so I am asked the permit question all the time, and I can tell you exactly what the requirement is.

My whole goal is to give you the honest answer and then explain the exceptions where that answer changes. For a normal backyard paver patio, the answer about the permit is short and simple. But there are some times, with things like tall walls, poured concrete, and a property in a historic district, that can be a much bigger deal. If you know the difference, it is the kind of thing that separates a truthful builder from one who isn’t being honest with you.

Do You Need a Permit for a Paver Patio in Savannah or Chatham County?

No. In Chatham County and Effingham County, and inside the City of Savannah, a standard paver patio doesn’t need a permit because it’s not considered a structure. The non-structural part is the important detail. The pavers are put on a compacted base, and they’re held in place by the sand between them and a ridge around the edge that keeps them from spreading. Nothing is locked down. You can lift the whole thing by hand and reset it, and that is the opposite of the county’s definition of a permanent structure.

That’s also why you don’t have to worry about the things most people worry about. A standard backyard paver patio doesn’t have a stop-work order, a fine, or a forced tear-out hanging over it, because there wasn’t any box to check in the first place, and there isn’t a permit office to keep you from starting on time either. We can break ground as soon as you’re ready.

Why Don’t Pavers Need a Permit When Concrete Does?

Here’s the part most people are never told. Getting a permit isn’t about your patio being a patio. It’s just about whether or not what you’re building is considered permanent. The test the county uses is simple: if the only way to remove something is to destroy it, then it’s a structure and will need a permit.

If you do a patio in solid concrete, then you’ve built something permanent. The only way to move the concrete is to use a jackhammer and a dumpster. So that would be looked at as a permanent structure, and then you’d have to get a permit.

A patio with pavers is the opposite. It’s built to last a lifetime, but every piece can be removed by hand. If someone needs to get to a utility line, or a part of it needs to be fixed or reset, we can lift the pavers, do the work, and then set them right back where they were. Nothing would need to be broken to get to it. That one difference, removable by hand instead of removable only by tearing it up, is the whole reason a patio built of pavers doesn’t need a permit and a concrete patio does. It’s also an argument for pavers in the first place. The same reason that keeps you from needing a permit also keeps your patio useful for decades instead of cracked and stuck.

Pool Decks and Pool Surrounds Usually Skip the Permit Too

The same reasoning actually works for pools as well. Most pool deck and pool surround work falls under repair work, which means no permit is needed. When we put pavers around an existing pool or replace and upgrade the deck, we’re working with the hardscape, the part you walk on, but not the actual structure of the pool. It is only what’s around the pool. So the same rules as a patio also apply to pool decks as well.

The one thing that is completely separate is a brand-new pool. When you build a new pool, that can have its own permit requirements for things like the electrical. The pavers and deck around the water will not usually cause that. If a new pool is part of your project, we will explain to you which parts of the job need a permit and which ones don’t.

When Does a Patio Project Actually Need a Permit?

There are a couple of actual cases where you could need a permit, and you should know what they are from the beginning. The first thing is a tall retaining wall. A retaining wall is a wall that holds back soil or a change in grade, so it just keeps dirt that wants to slide downhill from doing that. Once a retaining wall is higher than 18 inches, you will probably have to get a permit, because at that point it’s doing the job of a structure.¹ The wall has a big job and has to be structurally sound for safety. That is the kind of thing that the county wants to keep track of.

Here’s the difference that sometimes confuses people. A freestanding wall is not the same as a retaining wall. A freestanding wall is like a low seat wall around a fire pit or a privacy wall, and it doesn’t hold back any dirt. It’s just standing on its own, and isn’t there for structural or safety reasons. A freestanding wall is treated differently than a retaining wall because nothing is being held back by it, but the county does permit fence-type structures, so that is exactly the kind of detail we confirm with the county before we build. The permit question isn’t about the height of the wall. It’s about whether or not the wall is holding something back.

The second thing is concrete, which we already talked about a little bit. If you pour it to be solid, you are building something permanent, and depending on footings and what it is attached to, that can pull a project into permit territory.

What If My Home Is in a Savannah Historic District?

This is the one exception that can make things more complicated, and it needs to be looked at carefully before you plan anything. Savannah has several historic districts downtown, and inside them the rules are different and they are strict. You don’t just need a standard permit. If your home is in a historic district, you will need a Certificate of Appropriateness from the historic review board, and the review will let you know what you are allowed to add or remove and how it has to look.

Actually, the ability to change hardscaping in these districts is very limited. It’s not a quick yes, and it’s not just a normal patio job. So if your home is inside one of the downtown historic districts, the question about a permit isn’t the simple one we started with. It becomes a question of licensing and review, and those questions need to be answered before the process starts.

When We’ll Tell You to Pump the Brakes

We would rather lose a job than put you in a bad spot. So now is where we tell you honestly that we may not be your installer. If your home is inside one of Savannah’s downtown historic districts, we are probably not the right people for the job. That work is very restricted, the licensing is its own problem, and we don’t take on these projects. Someone who specializes in historic-district work could help you much better, and we will point you in that direction instead of pretending it’s a normal patio job, because it isn’t.

If your project really needs a permit, a retaining wall over 18 inches, or a special design you want poured in concrete, we are not going to disregard that just to get the job. We’ll tell you the step is real, what it will need, and whether there’s a smarter way to get the patio you want without going to all that trouble. Most of the time, there is. The answer you get from us will be the truth, not always what you want to hear.

That can work the other way too. If another builder is telling you a basic backyard paver patio in Chatham or Effingham County needs a permit, slow down and ask them why. For a standard patio here, it does not, and a builder who says it does is either misinformed or trying to add expense to the job.