The first call: turning a permit into a conversation

Calling off a permit is warm calling, not cold calling — you know something real about their business. The difference between sounding like a telemarketer and sounding like a local pro is whether you use what the project record already tells you.

The two-minute pre-call

• Scan the header — address, project type, permit class, status, value, units, floors, and the builder. The shape of the job at a glance.
• Open the score breakdown — the five buckets tell you your angle. A timing-driven 72 means lead with the schedule; a connections-driven 72 means lead with the relationship.
• Check Reachability first — it tells you how good the contact info is before you sink time into chasing it. If it's thin, use Find phone to enrich it.
• Check the builder's other permits — one pull is a maybe; five in a quarter is a real account worth a relationship, and your best talking point.

The opener

"Hi, this is [name] with [company] — we do [trade] out of [city]. I saw the permit go through for the project at [address]. Have you locked in your [trade] sub yet, or is that still open?"

That's it. It's honest about how you found them, specific enough to prove you're paying attention, and it ends on a question they can answer without commitment.

The three outcomes

1. 1
   "Still open"

   Ask two scoping questions (timeline, and who's running the job day-to-day), offer to come by the site or send a quote, and get a name and email before you hang up. Move the card to Contacted, then create a follow-up on your Calendar so it can't go quiet.
2. 2
   "Already awarded"

   "Good to hear it's moving — what else do you have coming up this year?" Then star the builder. Their next permit lands in your notification inbox under the WATCHLIST label — the lead comes to you.
3. 3
   Voicemail

   Fifteen seconds max: name, company, the address of their project, one sentence of what you do, phone number twice. Then send the follow-up email — Scout's first-contact template drafts it in 30 seconds, and it's logged on the lead automatically.