The city of Los Angeles is issuing fewer rebuilding permits in the Pacific Palisades as a result of a complicated insurance landscape, locals say.
In November, just 61 rebuild permits were issued in the neighborhood recovering from January's Palisades Fire that destroyed thousands of homes.
That's slightly higher than the previous month, but it's down from September, when a peak of 79 permits were issued, according to data released Thursday by Pali Builds, a resident-run database tracking the rebuild.
More than that, November saw the longest lag time between permit submittal and issuance since the fires. It took an average of 93 days, compared to last month's 82-day average.
In all, 347 building permits have been approved post-fire, according to Pali Builds.
Residents decry beleaguered insurance and permitting environment
The slowdown is "no surprise," Pali Builds leadership wrote in its blog post with the latest numbers.
One of the biggest challenges threatening the speed of the rebuild, according to Pali Builds, is insurance. "Insurance companies continue to win the payout war," the database said.
The California Department of Insurance "continues to receive and mediate complaints filed with the Department against State Farm and all other insurers in order to seek resolution where possible," according to Gabriel Sanchez, the department's press secretary.
"Our priority is to safeguard wildfire survivors from unfair and illegal insurer practices by ensuring a thorough review of complaints and facts related to potential violations, while facilitating the prompt payment of claims," Sanchez told Homes.com in a statement Monday.
The latest insurance data, released by the state's insurance department at the end of July, showed that there had been more than 16,200 residential claims from the Palisades Fire. As of July, about 15,100 of those claims had been paid — valued at more than $12.4 billion.
More than that, though, there has been a slowdown in the time it takes the city to review, approve and issue permits, according to Pali Builds.
A spokesperson for Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told Homes.com Monday that the mayor is "committed to restoring the community and expediting every aspect of the rebuilding process." The mayor has instituted a series of executive orders already to speed up the rebuild and has called on the banking and insurance industries to strengthen consumer protections.
The first post-fire new build is completed in the Palisades
Despite the slowdown, earlier this month, real estate professionals and local Palisadians gathered to celebrate what some, including Mayor Karen Bass, have called the first post-fire rebuild.
The home at 915 Kagawa is a four-bedroom, four-and-a-half-bath new build spanning nearly 4,000 square feet. It was built by Thomas James Homes.
The residence officially received its certificate of occupancy, the final step in the build process, on Nov. 21 — just about six months after receiving a permit in April and starting construction in May. It's important to note, however, that the homebuilder purchased the property in November 2024 and submitted its first plans for approval before the fires began.
"This isn't entirely about a streamlined process. I think the city's really trying hard," the homebuilder's CEO, James Mead, said at the grand opening of the home. "It's about what you can do if you've got a professionalized approach to permitting."
Executives at Thomas James said the house won't be up for sale — at least not anytime soon. Instead, it'll serve as a community center and sales hub as the homebuilder continues rebuilding efforts in the neighborhood.
Even so, that the home is standing is a signal of what's to come in the Palisades, according to developer Rick Caruso.
"As we're coming up on the year anniversary, and people start feeling like they've been left behind and forgotten, this is really going to give a lot of people hope," Caruso said at the grand opening event.