Chicago & Cook County public records
Helptyfy reads every Chicago building permit, Cook County demolition, land sale and new business license, then shows you which jobs still need an HVAC, electrical, plumbing, painting, roofing or concrete contractor, and who to call. New for residential shops: which homes are due for a new AC, furnace, roof or driveway, on one map, with the people who just moved in first.
The part of the market you can't see
Most private work never hits a bid board. By the time a project is posted, the GC already has a short list of subs they call first. The record shows it much earlier: land changes hands, a site gets cleared, a new tenant files a license, a permit names a GC, an 811 ticket books the excavator.
Helptyfy turns those records into a call list.
Live counts from the last 180 days (land sales: 12 months).
How it works
Helptyfy reads Chicago building permits, 811 dig tickets and new business licenses, plus Cook County demolitions and property sales, about 35,000 records, and groups them by address into projects.
A permit names the general contractor but no HVAC, electrical or plumbing contractor yet. That's an open seat. Each lead gets a fit score from job size, freshness, scope, a scheduled dig and your distance.
One click drafts the email, the call script and a text, written from the record and your company profile. Save it to your pipeline and Helptyfy reminds you when to follow up.
Straight from today's records
Pulled live from the City of Chicago permit file when this page loaded. The GC is named, the job is big, and the HVAC seat is still empty on the record.
See all of today's leads →Who it's for
Get a daily list of permitted jobs where the GC is named but your trade isn't. See which GCs keep leaving your seat open, and who they used last time.
Meet owners before they pick a builder: land sales with the new owner's name, demolitions, new tenants, and permits filed without a GC.
Every active job over $50K on one map, with the GC and the dig date. Plan routes, time deliveries and spot the busiest builders.
Permits never name the painter or the roofer, so every new building and build-out is a job to ask about. Helptyfy shows the builder the day they go on the record, with their phone, sorted into Call today, This week and Worth a look.
Concrete goes in first, and a permit has no seat for the concrete contractor. Helptyfy shows new buildings and foundation permits with the builder to call, every new garage that needs a slab, and buildings the City cited for cracked walks, stairs and foundations.
Find the homes whose AC or furnace is probably 15+ years old, and see the new owners first, street by street.
New · for residential shops
The same public records, pointed at houses. Helptyfy finds homes whose AC or furnace is probably 15+ years old, puts the ones that just sold first and sizes the system. Roofers and concrete companies see every house by how old its roof or driveway probably is. No names are read or saved.
Homes sold in the last 90 days with no AC or furnace replacement on file, with the likely size of the unit.
Pick what you sell: AC and furnace, roofs or driveways. Every house is colored by how old it probably is, with the streets where old ones cluster.
Tell it what you want in plain words and it narrows the homes: by unit age, drive time, sale date and past customers.
What's inside
A 3D map of every project. Column height is job value; your leads glow amber.
GC named, your trade missing, with the evidence and a link to the city record.
Land sales, demolitions, new businesses and 811 tickets, months ahead of the bid.
Who's building the most, which subs each GC uses, and who you're up against.
“New restaurants over $250k in Logan Square with no HVAC this month.”
Email, call script and text, written from the permit and your company profile.
Drag deals from intro to won. Overdue follow-ups show up in red.
See how many new matches appear every time the records refresh.
Your pipeline and saved searches are saved to your account, no other account sees them, and Helptyfy never sends anything for you.
Pick AC and furnace, roofs or driveways, and see every house colored by how old it probably is.
Homes that just sold with no replacement on file, sized in tons and BTU, with why each one is a good fit.
Every house by how old its roof or driveway probably is, for roofers and concrete companies, with hail reports near each roof.
Open any permit as a clean page you can read and print: the full scope, the dates and every company on it.
One click opens the satellite view of any job or house in Google Maps, so you see the site before you call.
One email a morning, only when there is something new: the best new jobs for your trade, with who to call. Starting soon for every shop.
Pricing
Full access for every shop. Up to 15 shops get rebates and ads done for them at 30% off. Card checkout opens soon.
Full access
$79/ month
Every lead and every page. 7 days free, then $79 a month. No contract.
Start free trial →★ Implementations · only 15 spots
$79/ month + 30% off
The same full access, plus we implement rebates and ads in your business. You get the deal and 30% off: video ads in three options from $767 a month (was $1,097), rebate paperwork $50 a month (was $72).
Claim a spot →Custom
Let's talk
Contact me and let's build a custom implementation. We'll figure out what you need and what we can implement for you to help you scale more.
Contact me →Try it free for 7 days: every lead, every page. Not charged until day 8; cancel before then and you pay nothing. How the trial works
FAQ
Public open-data portals: the City of Chicago Data Portal (building permits, building violations, 811 dig tickets, business licenses) and Cook County Open Data (demolition and asbestos permits, Assessor property sales and parcel records), plus the towns' own permit lists and NOAA's storm reports for hail. Addresses without coordinates are placed with the free US Census geocoder. Every lead links back to its source record.
Yes. Every permit lead opens as a page you can read, print or save as a PDF: the full scope as the City wrote it, the dates, the fees and every company on it. It is Helptyfy's copy of the public record, not the official permit. The official permit is kept by the City of Chicago Department of Buildings (or the village, in the suburbs). The City's Building Permit and Inspection Records site shows each address's permits, and scanned permits are given out through a FOIA request.
Chicago permits and dig tickets update daily at the source. Helptyfy shows when its copy was last loaded, and every lead links to its record. Property sales reach the Assessor's file with a delay of a month or two.
Chicago's permit file names the companies and people on a job, but it has no phone numbers or emails. Helptyfy matches each contractor to the City of Chicago's own list of licensed contractors, which gives a business phone, and shows that number with the contractor's license number and a button to call. About 9 in 10 general contractors on current permits match. Emails are not on any free public list, so every contact also has a one-click "Find email" search, and you can save what you find on the pipeline card. Call and text people one at a time, yourself: never put these numbers in an auto-dialer or a text blast.
It's a strong hint, not proof. Contractors are added to permits when they're filed or revised, and some GCs carry a sub without listing them yet. That's exactly why the drafted intro asks: “Has the work been awarded yet?”
Business-to-business outreach to contractors named on public permits is common practice. Keep emails honest and include a way to opt out (CAN-SPAM), don't text cell phones without consent, and check do-not-call lists before cold calling. This isn't legal advice.
All of Chicago for permits, dig tickets and licenses, and all of suburban Cook County for demolitions and property sales. More Illinois cities can be added as they publish open data.
The residential half of Helptyfy. It reads every house's year built, size, central air and furnace type from the Cook County Assessor, every heating and cooling permit the towns send the county, and the state's home sale filings. It shows which homes probably have a 15+ year old AC or furnace, puts the ones that just sold first and sizes the system. Roofers and concrete companies get Roof ages and Driveway ages from the same records, and one map shows all three. Open it from the Homeowners group in the sidebar.
A permit on file gives the install year. Without one it is an estimate: units wear out on a curve, and a replacement in a year the town reported well would most likely show up as a permit. Every home shows its chance of being 15+ years old, a high, medium or low confidence and the reason in plain words. Towns that report steadily (Streamwood, Schaumburg, Bartlett, Berwyn, Oak Park) give the sharpest answers; Chicago needs no permit for a like-for-like swap, so it stays low.
No. No names are read or saved, and Helptyfy never looks up a homeowner's phone: no calls and no texts to homeowners. It shows which homes and streets are likely due, so you can plan where your door hangers, yard signs and trucks go. This isn't legal advice: check your town's solicitation rules before you go door to door.
No. It drafts the message and opens it in your own email app. You decide what goes out.
Contact us
Questions before you sign up, a demo for your shop, help with your plan, or a custom build. Email us and a real person writes back.
Go find it before the bid list fills up.