Who issues the building permit for a barndominium in Burnet, TX?
Outside it, Burnet County Development Services issues a Class A or Class B permit, and will not issue your septic permit until that building permit exists. No Texas license exists for home builders or general contractors, and so the person you hire is an independent contractor. The county's order is fixed and it will not process an incomplete packet: the 911 address first, then the building permit, then septic. Add the river authority's septic zone around Lake Buchanan and Inks Lake, plus the granite and gneiss of the Llano Uplift under your pad, and the dirt decides more of a Burnet build than the shell does.
Two desks, split by one line. Inside the city limits the City of Burnet issues it: a permit is required for any building work that alters a structure or adds a new one on the property, and dwellings are first on its list. The city took up the 2021 International Codes, the 2021 International Residential Code among them, with the 2021 Fire Code and the 2023 National Electrical Code, for new permits received on or after April 1, 2025.
Outside the line it is Burnet County Development Services, in two classes set by the flood hazard area. Class A, clear of any flood hazard area, is application and payment with no county inspection of the structure. Class B, within a designated flood hazard boundary, asks for an elevation certificate, a site plan that marks the flood zone, and two inspections, one before the pour and one at finished construction. Elevation information on a FEMA Elevation Certificate is certified by land surveyors, architects or engineers authorized by law, so a Class B lot adds a surveyor. Pull the parcel on the FEMA Flood Map Service Center first.
The county will not process an incomplete packet, and will not issue the septic permit without the building permit first. Read the full chain on the Burnet County permit page, or compare Burnet with the other five in the permit guide for all six counties.
City of Burnet Building Department, as read September 13, 2026.
City of Burnet, Burnet Code Adoption 2021 (PDF, city-hosted), as read September 13, 2026.
FEMA, Elevation Certificate FAQ, October 2023, as read September 13, 2026.
FEMA Flood Map Service Center, as read September 13, 2026.
Burnet County On-Site Sewage Facilities and Development Services, as read September 13, 2026.
Who permits the septic, the floodplain and the driveway in Burnet County?
Three of the four sit in one office. The fourth is your precinct commissioner.
Septic splits again. Burnet County has eight on-site sewage authorized agents, the county and the Lower Colorado River Authority among them, with Granite Shoals administered by LCRA and Bertram by Burnet County. Inside the city limits Burnet is its own agent. The county permits and inspects every system whatever the tract size, which sets aside the state acreage exception.
LCRA is the state's designated authorized agent inside its own jurisdiction, drawn around Buchanan, Inks, Lyndon B. Johnson, Marble Falls and Travis. Four of those are Burnet County water. The zone runs 2,200 feet around the upper Highland Lakes: a Restricted Zone at each lake, plus a Water Quality Zone reaching 2,000 feet horizontally past its outer boundary. Inside it a permit is required before any system is constructed or installed, no matter the lot size, and allow up to 30 days from the date the application is submitted. The county links to LCRA's address-searchable map without saying which lake lots fall inside, so search your own address. The septic permit guide walks the application.
Floodplain: the Floodplain Administrator appointed by Commissioners Court, inside Development Services. One foot of freeboard above base flood elevation is required, two feet recommended in an A zone.
Driveway: your precinct commissioner, on a county road access permit. The commissioner sets culvert location, length and diameter at a site meeting, and approval must be in hand before the 911 address is assigned. TxDOT approves a driveway onto a Farm to Market, Ranch Road or State Highway.
TCEQ OARS county search, Burnet County (CNTY_CD 27), as read September 13, 2026.
TCEQ OARS county search, identical entry returned for Travis, Burnet and Llano counties, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA On-Site Sewage Facilities Program, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA On-Site Sewage Facilities Rules, Section 6, Area of Jurisdiction, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA On-Site Sewage Facilities Rules, Section 10.05(b), as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA On-site Sewage Rules Frequently Asked Questions, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA Water Quality Jurisdictions map, as read September 13, 2026.
Burnet County On-Site Sewage Facilities and Development Services, as read September 13, 2026.
Does the Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance apply to your Burnet tract?
It applies to the Colorado River watershed in Burnet County above the Regulated Pool Elevation of the Highland Lakes, as drawn on the official Ordinance Map. It regulates buildings, roads, paved storage areas and parking lots, and also land-disturbing activity: clearing, excavating, grading, contouring, mining and depositing refuse, waste or fill. That reaches the pad, the drive and the pasture you clear, not only the house.
An LCRA development permit is required if impervious cover will exceed 10,000 square feet and/or land disturbance will exceed one acre. A single-family residence under both can file a written notification with LCRA instead. Over 10,000 square feet of cover but under one acre disturbed, the notification route stays open only where the site meets the downstream buffer guidelines in the LCRA Technical Manual. Eleven local governments administer part or all of the ordinance under interlocal agreements, so ask LCRA which body administers your address.
That one-acre line shows up twice. The TPDES Construction General Permit TXR150000 separately covers construction that disturbs an acre or more, or construction belonging to a larger common development plan that will disturb at least an acre. Below one acre no coverage is required. Have the site plan measured, not estimated.
LCRA Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance, Section 1, Title and Scope, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance program page, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance program page, Required notifications and permits, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance, Section 4.1(b), Written Notification, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance program page, Interlocal agreements, as read September 13, 2026.
TCEQ, Stormwater Discharges from Construction Activities: Am I Regulated?, as read September 13, 2026.
What is under the pad in Burnet, Texas?
Old rock. Burnet is one of the core counties of the Llano Uplift, a large granite batholith and the major structural feature of central Texas, with Precambrian granites and metamorphic rocks forming the central dome. At Inks Lake State Park, on the east edge of the uplift in Burnet County, pink Valley Spring gneiss, a Precambrian metamorphic rock, juts up through the limestone. Whether that contact sits under your tract is a question for the excavator and a test hole, not something the park settles.
The other ground in central Texas is the Edwards Plateau: shallow soils underlain by limestone, many springs, stony hills and steep canyons. Either way the quote question is the same. Ask any builder pricing the site whether rock excavation is inside the number or excluded, and ask the septic designer whether the design assumes a trench or a surface system.
The rock decides the water too. The Ellenburger-San Saba Aquifer is a minor aquifer in parts of 16 counties in the Llano Uplift area, and the Hickory Aquifer carries radionuclides derived from the Precambrian granite of the uplift. On a well rather than a city or district meter, ask the driller which formation the well is completed in and what the water is tested for before you close.
Texas Water Development Board, Report 360 Chapter 9, Paleozoic Aquifers of the Llano Uplift, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Water Development Board, Report 360 Chapter 9, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, Texas Ecoregions, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Water Development Board, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Water Development Board, as read September 13, 2026.
What does the groundwater district ask of a new house well near Burnet?
Paperwork before the rig moves. The Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District, headquartered in Burnet, covers exactly the same ground as the county; voters confirmed its creation in September 2005. Its rules, last revised August 25, 2026, bar drilling or completing any new well until it is registered and the district has given written authorization to start. The general manager answers a complete registration within 15 calendar days, saying whether the well is exempt and whether its spot meets spacing. An approved exempt well then has 180 days to be drilled, and the driller owes the district a well report, with GPS coordinates of the wellhead and the aquifer it draws from, within 60 days of finishing.
Acreage sets the category. Since October 15, 2018 a new well is exempt from a permit only on a tract larger than ten acres, and only if its pump and fittings cap it at 25,000 gallons every 24 hours. On ten acres or less the well runs under what the district calls a permit by rule, and one drilled after March 27, 2024 must be equipped to stay under 10,000 gallons a day. Both are registered, and the smaller-tract well can be held to drought limits. A family that plans a pool, an orchard and a horse trough on a five acre lot should do that arithmetic before the pump is sized.
Where the hole goes is measured too. For a Trinity well of 17.36 gallons a minute or less, a tract platted after September 1, 2009 needs at least two acres; for the granite, Hickory, Ellenburger-San Saba, Marble Falls and Welge-Lion Mountain formations around the uplift the floor is one acre. Either way the well stands 100 feet from the next registered well in that formation and 50 feet from your line, and has to go in within 30 feet of the point named in the authorization, so stake it before the pad and septic field are drawn. Wells drilled after June 1, 2024 carry a cement or bentonite seal, generally at least 50 feet deep, and the wellhead must take a measuring tape. Buy a place with a well already on it and the new owner has 90 days to file the transfer.
Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District Rules as Revised August 25, 2026, Preamble and Rules 3.01, 3.08, 3.31, 3.60 and 3.70, as read October 29, 2026.
Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District Rules as Revised August 25, 2026, Rules 3.40 and 3.67, as read October 29, 2026.
Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District Rules as Revised August 25, 2026, Rules 6.02 and 6.04 and Appendix A, as read October 29, 2026.
Why did the rules change for Trinity wells northeast of Burnet in 2026?
Because the water there is thin. On January 23, 2026 the district put the Northeast Burnet County Trinity Aquifer Management Zone into effect, after a stakeholder committee and public meetings at the Oakalla Community Center. Its west edge is U.S. Highway 281 and its outer edges the county line; on the south it follows Ranch to Market Road 2340 east for about half a mile, then the North Fork San Gabriel River back to the county line. The district drew it around the Briggs and Oakalla area. The district's reasons are in the rule itself: low transmissivity, wells of modest to low yield, little drawdown to spare, water already poor in places, and dense clusters of wells plus many subdivisions each running on its own well.
The zone rules touch Trinity wells only. A well finished in the granite, Hickory, Ellenburger-San Saba, Marble Falls or Welge-Lion Mountain is outside them. For the Trinity, a tract of ten acres or less now gets one well, no matter when it was carved out, and a tract platted after January 23 needs ten acres, not two, to host even a small household well. A new well may not draw from the Glen Rose and a deeper Trinity layer at once; finished below the Glen Rose it needs a manufactured packer that will not degrade. Any Trinity well there that is not for a household or stock needs an operating permit and a meter, and its yearly cap is a quarter acre-foot per acre, half the usual default.
For a barndominium buyer that changes the order of questions. Before closing on a small tract inside the zone, find out whether a well is already registered on it, which formation the neighbors draw from, and whether the seller's plat date leaves room for one. The district says closer oversight of exempt wells would need authorization from the Legislature, so for now it keeps measuring water levels and may adjust the zone as the data comes in.
Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District Rules as Revised August 25, 2026, Rule 4.05(a) and (b) and Historical Notes; district press release and zone page, January 28, 2026, as read October 29, 2026.
Central Texas Groundwater Conservation District Rules as Revised August 25, 2026, Rules 4.05(c) to (e) and 5.02(c) and Appendix A, part B, as read October 29, 2026.
What do barndominium builders in Burnet, TX run into first on a lot?
The sequence, before anything physical. The county fixes the order: 911 address, then building permit, then septic permit. But driveway approval from your precinct commissioner has to be in hand before the 911 address is assigned. So on a raw tract the first call is the commissioner and a site meeting about a culvert, not a builder and a floor plan. Then the plat question: a split is exempt from platting only where every lot is over 10 acres with no new streets, and even an exempt split is registered with Development Services.
Price the dirt separately from the shell. The Central Texas cost guide holds the one builder figure this site publishes and explains why the septic, the driveway, the power, the water, the rock and the pad get priced on your own tract instead. In the same county, Marble Falls requires a building permit for all construction inside its city limits, under a later code year, the 2024 International Residential Code. For the whole run from raw land to finished slab, start with building a barndominium in Central Texas.
City of Marble Falls FAQ, Do I need a permit within the city limit?, as read September 13, 2026.
City of Marble Falls Building Division, as read September 13, 2026.
Burnet County On-Site Sewage Facilities and Development Services, as read September 13, 2026.
How do you check barndominium builders in Burnet, TX?
Not through a state roster, because there is not one. Texas issues no state license for general contracting, and the Texas Residential Construction Commission no longer exists: it was abolished, and its enabling Act lapsed on September 1, 2009. Every barndominium builder in Burnet is an independent contractor, so ask which of the permits above the builder pulls in their own name and which stay in yours.
The trades are verifiable. Plumbers hold state licenses from the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners, electricians through TDLR, where non-exempt electrical work must be done through a licensed electrical contractor, and any on-site sewage installer, apprentice, maintenance provider or maintenance technician through TCEQ, Installer I for standard systems and Installer II for all types. All three agencies run a public license lookup. Check the septic one hardest here, because the county permits and inspects every system whatever the tract size.
On a lake lot that paperwork keeps running after the build. Inside LCRA's jurisdiction an inspection is required on every transfer of ownership before it will approve the new owner for continued use, and an aerobic treatment unit needs a maintenance contract for the first two years. After that the owner may do the maintenance, but only after taking the class and passing the test.
Scope, shell versus finished house, changes what a quote covers, and turnkey barndominium construction sets out what sits in each one before you start collecting bids.
Office of the Texas Governor, Business Permit Office, Texas Business Licenses and Permits Guide, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Sunset Advisory Commission, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, Electricians program, as read September 13, 2026.
Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, as read September 13, 2026.
TCEQ, Occupational Licenses: On-Site Sewage Facilities (Septic Systems), as read September 13, 2026.
TCEQ, On-site Sewage Facilities: Information for Regulators, as read September 13, 2026.
LCRA On-site Sewage Rules Frequently Asked Questions, as read September 13, 2026.
Burnet County On-Site Sewage Facilities and Development Services, as read September 13, 2026.
Close by: Bertram, Marble Falls, Buchanan Dam, Briggs, Oakalla, Kingsland. The whole county: Burnet County. The next town along: Marble Falls.
Lot and permit questions near Burnet
Does the City of Burnet issue a building permit for a barndominium?
Yes, inside the city limits. Burnet requires a building permit whenever building work alters a structure or adds a new one on the property, and houses head its list. The city took up the 2021 International Codes, the 2021 International Residential Code among them, plus the 2021 Fire Code and the 2023 National Electrical Code, effective for new permits received on or after April 1, 2025. The City of Burnet is also its own on-site sewage authorized agent inside those limits.
Do I need a county building permit outside Burnet city limits?
Yes. Burnet County Development Services issues a Class A or Class B building permit outside city limits, and the county will not issue the septic permit without it. Class A covers a site clear of any flood hazard area and is application and payment only, with no county inspection of the structure. Class B covers a site within a designated flood hazard boundary and requires an elevation certificate from a surveyor or a letter from an engineer, a site plan that marks the flood zone, and two inspections, one before the pour and one at finished construction.
What has to happen first on a raw tract in Burnet County?
The driveway. Approval from your precinct commissioner, on a county road access permit, has to be in hand before the 911 address is assigned, and the 911 address comes before the building permit, which comes before the septic permit. The commissioner sets culvert location, length and diameter at a site meeting. The county will not process an incomplete packet, so the order is not optional.
Who permits septic on a lot near Lake Buchanan or Inks Lake?
It depends on whether the lot falls inside the Lower Colorado River Authority's water quality zone. LCRA is a TCEQ-designated authorized agent and its on-site sewage jurisdiction is drawn around Lake Buchanan, Inks Lake, Lake LBJ, Lake Marble Falls and Lake Travis, running 2,200 feet around the upper Highland Lakes. Inside that zone a permit is required before any system is constructed or installed, whatever the lot size, and you should allow up to 30 days from submission. Outside the zone it is Burnet County, which also permits and inspects every system regardless of tract size. Search your address on LCRA's jurisdiction map to find out which desk you are at.
Is a barndominium builder in Texas licensed by the state?
No. Texas issues no state license for general contracting, and the Texas Residential Construction Commission no longer exists: it was abolished, and its enabling Act lapsed on September 1, 2009. A builder here is an independent contractor. The trades are licensed: plumbers by way of the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners, electricians through TDLR with non-exempt work done through a licensed electrical contractor, and on-site sewage installers and maintenance providers through TCEQ. Each of those three agencies runs a public license lookup you can check yourself.
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