Can You Do Your Own Electrical Work in Wisconsin? The Janesville Answer

What the state allows

The licensing statute exempts a residential property owner working on premises they own and occupy as a residence, "unless a license or registration issued by the department is required by local ordinance" (Wis. Stat. 101.862). The exemption is about the licence, not the permit: a new service, feeder or branch circuit still needs one before work starts (SPS 316.012).

What Janesville allows

• No permit: replacing an existing switch or outlet in the same location (City of Janesville).
• Homeowner permit allowed: branch-circuit wiring in a house you own and occupy. Fees run $1.17 per outlet, switch or fixture.
• Master Electrician only: anything on the service or the feeders of a single-family home, which is where a panel upgrade, a meter change or most generator hookups sit (Building Division).

Rentals are different: the exemption is for a house you own and live in, so a landlord wiring a rental unit needs a licensed electrician. Milton's code adds that broken or defective sockets, switches and receptacles may be repaired or replaced without a permit (Milton code 10-212).

Where homeowners get caught

Two places. First, concealed work: Janesville requires wiring to be inspected before it is covered (Janesville electrical code), so a circuit run behind new drywall without a permit tends to come up at inspection or at sale. Second, old wiring: adding a circuit in a house with aluminum branch wiring or live knob-and-tube is a job where a mistake at the connection is the hazard. When a job is bigger than an outlet swap, the prices to plan with are on the electrician cost page, and small jobs are on electrical repairs.