---
title: "Construction and Building Inspector"
description: "Inspect structures using engineering skills to determine structural soundness and compliance with specifications, building codes, and other regulations.…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/construction-and-building-inspector"
last-updated: "2026-08-23T15:56:39.581Z"
---

# Construction and Building Inspector

**Category:** Construction and Extraction · **SOC code:** 47-4011 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 47-4011.00

Inspect structures using engineering skills to determine structural soundness and compliance with specifications, building codes, and other regulations. Inspections may be general in nature or may be limited to a specific area, such as electrical systems or plumbing.

Also advertised as: Building Code Administrator; Building Inspector; Building Official; Code Enforcement Officer; Code Inspector; Combination Building Inspector; Construction Inspector; Electrical Inspector.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $74,690 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $35.91/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $47,140 to $114,200, with the middle half between $58,860 and $94,710
- **Total US employment:** 146,720
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Some preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** -0.8% over 2024–2034 (BLS EP, 2024–2034)
- **Annual job openings:** 14,800 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 43/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 146,720 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $47,140 |
| 25th | $58,860 |
| 50th (median) | $74,690 |
| 75th | $94,710 |
| 90th | $114,200 |
| Mean (average) | $77,730 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| AK | $102,410 | $100,050 | 270 |
| CA | $101,290 | $91,483 | 13,420 |
| CT | $98,670 | $95,232 | 1,430 |
| WA | $96,140 | $89,840 | 3,090 |
| MN | $88,670 | $89,910 | 1,390 |
| DC | $86,200 | $78,434 | 370 |
| OR | $84,510 | $81,762 | 1,780 |
| MA | $83,200 | $78,671 | 4,290 |
| NJ | $81,760 | $75,144 | 5,950 |
| CO | $79,950 | $77,582 | 3,700 |
| NY | $79,460 | $73,628 | 11,160 |
| HI | $79,320 | $72,141 | 710 |
| ND | $78,570 | $88,322 | 180 |
| IL | $78,340 | $78,373 | 2,560 |
| RI | $77,420 | $75,694 | 270 |

38 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 53 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/construction-and-building-inspector/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/construction-and-building-inspector.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 147,600 in the 2024–2034 base year to 146,500 by the end of the cycle — a loss of 1,200 jobs, or -0.8%. Declining: -0.8% against 3.1% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 14,800 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2024–2034.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Some preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** 5 years or more.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Moderate-term on-the-job training.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| High School Diploma | 36.0% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 36.0% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 16.0% |
| Some College Courses | 4.0% |
| Associate's Degree (or other 2-year degree) | 4.0% |
| Master's Degree | 4.0% |

## What the work involves

- Review and interpret plans, blueprints, site layouts, specifications, or construction methods to ensure compliance to legal requirements and safety regulations.
- Confer with owners, violators, or authorities to explain regulations or recommend remedial actions.
- Maintain daily logs and supplement inspection records with photographs.
- Conduct inspections, using survey instruments, metering devices, tape measures, or test equipment.
- Train, direct, or supervise other construction inspectors.
- Inspect bridges, dams, highways, buildings, wiring, plumbing, electrical circuits, sewers, heating systems, or foundations during and after construction for structural quality, general safety, or conformance to specifications and codes.
- Monitor installation of plumbing, wiring, equipment, or appliances to ensure that installation is performed properly and is in compliance with applicable regulations.
- Inspect and monitor construction sites to ensure adherence to safety standards, building codes, or specifications.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Reading Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Evaluation — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Negotiation — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Building and Construction — importance 4.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Customer and Personal Service — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Design — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Law and Government — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Problem Sensitivity — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Inductive Reasoning — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Realistic (R), Conventional (C), Investigative (I).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 6.17 |
| C — Conventional | 5.41 |
| I — Investigative | 4.10 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.15 |
| S — Social | 1.46 |
| A — Artistic | 1.22 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ISTJ | 95.6 |
| ISTP | 79.5 |
| ESTJ | 76.7 |
| ISFJ | 75.0 |
| INTJ | 73.8 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Government Property Inspector and Investigator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/government-property-inspector-and-investigator) — median $80,730
- [First-Line Supervisor of Construction Trades and Extraction Workers](https://nuecareer.com/careers/first-line-supervisor-of-construction-trades-and-extraction-workers) — median $79,920
- [Transportation Vehicle, Equipment and Systems Inspector, Except Aviation](https://nuecareer.com/careers/transportation-vehicle-equipment-and-systems-inspector) — median $92,100
- [Civil Engineering Technologist and Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/civil-engineering-technologist-and-technician) — median $64,950
- [Aviation Inspector](https://nuecareer.com/careers/aviation-inspector) — median $92,100
- [Solar Energy Installation Manager](https://nuecareer.com/careers/solar-energy-installation-manager) — median $79,920
- [Maintenance and Repair Worker, General](https://nuecareer.com/careers/maintenance-and-repair-worker-general) — median $49,590
- [Plumber](https://nuecareer.com/careers/plumber) — median $63,800
- [Electrician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/electrician) — median $63,190
- [Energy Auditor](https://nuecareer.com/careers/energy-auditor) — median $74,690

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 30.3 Database, May 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/construction-and-building-inspector