Carefree Building Permit and Impact Fees for a New Home: The Valuation Basis in Table 3-A

A new home in the Town of Carefree carries a building permit fee driven by one number: the construction valuation of your house. Carefree does not price the permit by square foot the way Scottsdale does. It runs the fee off a valuation table written into the Town Code, the same approach most Arizona towns use. This page gives you the real basis from Carefree's own ordinance, so you can budget the permit line instead of guessing, and it flags where the live dollar figure has to come from the Town.

How Carefree sets the permit fee

Carefree builds the permit fee from the value of the work, and the Town Code is specific about where that value comes from. The building permit fee provisions live in Section 10-1-2(G) of the Town Code, and they point to two things: a fee table and the adopted building code. The Town's posted resource states it directly:

Building permit fees are found in Table 3-A of Section 10-1-2(G) of the Town Code, and valuation is based on an engineer's certified estimate of the cost of the proposed improvements. All fees shall be in accordance with Chapter One of the International Building Code as adopted by the Town of Carefree.

So the process runs in two steps. First, the Town sets your home's valuation, the estimated construction cost. Carefree ties that figure to an engineer's certified estimate of the cost of the work, not a number you pick yourself, which is stricter than the ICC-table default some towns use. Second, the fee comes off Table 3-A in the Town Code, the tiered schedule that follows Chapter One of the adopted 2018 International Building Code. The permit fee climbs as the valuation climbs, so a larger or more expensive home pays a larger permit fee. Plan review and inspection charges follow the same Chapter One structure, which in the I-code model sets plan review as a share of the permit fee.

The exact dollar figures in Table 3-A are set by the Town and updated through its fee schedule, which Carefree posted as effective June 6, 2025. The Town's codified building-permit table is the controlling source, but the live per-tier dollar amounts are not reliably machine-readable from the Town site. So treat the basis here (valuation from an engineer's estimate, fee from Table 3-A under IBC Chapter One) as the verified part, and pull the current dollar figure for your valuation from the Carefree Building Department or the posted fee schedule.

For a sense of scale, take a custom home with an engineer's certified construction cost of $600,000. The Town sets the valuation at that $600,000 figure, then reads the permit fee off the matching Table 3-A tier, and adds the Chapter One plan review charge on top, which in the I-code model is a percentage of the permit fee. The number you owe rises step by step with the valuation, so a $1 million home pays more than a $600,000 one. Because the per-tier dollars are set by the Town, ask for the Table 3-A figure at your valuation rather than working from a rule of thumb.

Why there are no city water or sewer impact fees

Impact fees are charges a city collects on new construction to pay for the public infrastructure that growth uses, authorized in Arizona under A.R.S. 9-463.05. Cities like Phoenix and Fountain Hills charge them for municipal water, sewer, parks, and fire. Carefree generally does not, because Carefree runs no town water or town sewer utility. A typical Carefree home sits on a private well or a water-hauling arrangement and an on-site septic system, which you permit and pay for separately.

That changes the budget math. Inside a fee-charging city, impact fees can be the single largest line on a new home. On a Carefree lot, your big separate costs are the septic system permit and install and the well drilling, which run through Maricopa County and the state, not a town impact-fee menu. So the permit fee plus its plan review, and then your well and septic, are the real numbers, not a stack of municipal impact fees.

When these fees come into play

• Build-on-your-lot. You apply through Carefree's permit portal or the Building Department, supply an engineer's certified cost estimate, and the Town sets your valuation and invoices the Table 3-A permit fee plus plan review.
• Valuation is verified, not self-declared. Because Carefree ties valuation to a certified estimate, a low number does not lower your fee the way it might where the town just takes the contract price. Build the estimate honestly.
• Well and septic, not city utilities. Plan the well and septic as their own permits and real install costs. On a rural Carefree lot those usually dwarf the building permit fee.

What this means for you

Budget the Carefree permit as a valuation-based fee, the same family as Cave Creek and Casa Grande, not a per-square-foot fee like Scottsdale. Get an engineer's certified cost estimate early, since that figure drives the permit fee directly. Then budget your well and septic separately, because Carefree has no town water or sewer impact fee to fold in. The dollar amounts in Table 3-A change when the Town updates its fee schedule, and the live figures are hard to pull from the Town site, so confirm the current per-valuation fee with the Carefree Building Department at 480-488-3686 before you rely on a number here.

This entry sits in the Carefree building-codes module alongside Carefree Residential Building Permit Requirements , which covers what you submit, and Carefree Adopted Building Codes , which covers the 2018 codes your plans are checked against. For how the basis differs across the metro, see valuation versus per-square-foot permit pricing in Arizona and how much a building permit costs in Arizona .

Source

The valuation basis, the Table 3-A reference, the engineer's-estimate rule, and the IBC Chapter One basis are written into the Town of Carefree's codified ordinance, a public record: Carefree Town Code Section 10-1-2 on American Legal Publishing . The current dollar figures live in the Town's Comprehensive Fee Schedule , and the permit process is described by the Town of Carefree Building Department . The statute behind impact fees is A.R.S. 9-463.05 .

These fees change when the Town updates its fee schedule, and the live Table 3-A figures are not easily pulled from the Town site. Confirm the current permit fee for your valuation, and your well and septic costs, with the Carefree Building Department before you rely on any number here for a budget.