OUR EVIDENCE STANDARD
How we evaluate contractor records
Hey Neighbor is responsible for the presentation, grouping and editorial explanation of records in this directory. Government agencies publish the underlying permit information. We distinguish what a record states from what it cannot establish.
Where the information comes from
We combine available permit feeds, reports, portal inventories and location records from the City of Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, Henderson, unincorporated Clark County and selected Boulder City reports. The coverage page reports saved counts and limitations. Snapshot acquisition date: 2026-10-27. A refresh may add older permits as well as recent records.
What counts as activity
Repeated source rows are grouped by jurisdiction and permit number. Multiple permits can still belong to one job. The default home-project selection excludes known commercial work, known new construction, public works and administrative activity, and identified homebuilders; it includes records with unspecified property type. Reliable mapped locations are required for neighborhood counts. This is a record count, not a count of completed jobs, customers or recommendations.
How companies are identified
Recorded professional fields, business identity evidence and reviewed name variants inform company profiles. An applicant is not automatically a contractor. Owner fields and unmatched individual applicants are excluded. Similar names alone do not establish that businesses are the same. Ambiguous business roles can be held out of search-indexable directories while the underlying records remain available for review.
What a license label means
Each license retains its own saved status, match evidence and review date. A match to an active listing is different from an individual board-record review. Board-history references require review of the outcome and responsible holder. A license label does not establish insurance, workmanship or an absence of complaints. Read the dated verification details and confirm current information before hiring.
Trade records and service specialties
A broad record labeled plumbing, electrical or mechanical work does not prove water-heater, panel-upgrade or AC-replacement experience. Our project guides give service-specific questions and link to clearly labeled broader trade evidence. We do not convert a generic permit category into an unsupported specialty claim.
Project-specific company matching
Project pages match saved first-party service descriptions to a homeowner need and require documented home-project activity in the selected area. These matches are separate from permit classifications. Company cards show the relevant advertised wording, source and check date; a match is a starting point to confirm the exact equipment, work and address directly.
Basic AC and heating repair can include ordinary residential HVAC firms as a clearly labeled trade-based starting point. Other specialty capabilities require relevant advertised evidence. Known closed businesses, commercial-only profiles and companies without matched active saved license checks are excluded from these shortlists. Companies are ordered by broader all-time trade records in the selected area, not by an unsupported specialty ranking.
We consolidate overlapping search phrases into one useful project topic. New specialty pages enter the sitemap only when they have at least three matched local companies and sufficient broader local project evidence. Neighborhood specialty pages are limited to core project needs; smaller or unsupported combinations remain in the broader trade directory. A useful planning page with insufficient local matches can remain available without being submitted for search indexing.
Geography and time periods
The City of Las Vegas directory uses the incorporated city boundary. The opening map covers the wider valley. Summerlin pages use the Summerlin South boundary. Other areas use their own mapped outlines; overlapping neighborhoods must not be added together. Recent counts use the displayed date interval. Weekly reports count only when their whole issuance range falls inside that interval.
How we choose our top picks
Our “best” lists are Hey Neighbor’s picks for documented local project experience. They are assembled from the available evidence, not from personal inspections or customer satisfaction scores. To qualify, a company must have an identified public profile, a visible project example, matching work in the selected area and trade, and all of its saved license checks matched active. Identities held for review are excluded.
Qualifying companies are ordered by their matching records in the displayed period, then available history in the same area and trade, then a stable identifier to resolve ties. We show up to ten; the headline always states the actual number. When fewer than three qualify, the page uses an unranked directory heading. Where the area has no recent records, the list uses available history and says so.
This is our definition of “best” for these experience-focused shortlists. It does not certify workmanship, price, insurance, current availability or an absence of complaints. Saved license checks have their own dates and must be confirmed before hiring. More recorded permits do not necessarily mean more completed jobs, and coverage is incomplete. Inclusion is determined by these evidence rules; there is no payment term in the selection formula.
Choose “Explore all matching companies” to see the wider activity directory. Changing the area, trade, period or other filters can take you out of the original shortlist. Specialist planning guides do not claim a top-company list unless the underlying specialty has been established.
How assisted picks work
“Help me choose 3” builds a shortlist within your selected map area, trade and dates. Each suggested company needs matched, current license evidence, recently reviewed business contact details, a supported relevant service and at least three qualifying local records. Known identity conflicts are excluded. A specific-service request also needs at least three records with supporting permit-type evidence.
We first look for established local activity, then recent activity among other qualifying companies, then relevant project experience when the selected service is supported. The recent window is the last 90 days within your selected dates. Where a distinct reason is not supported, another strong local match can share a similar explanation. Three is a maximum, not a guarantee. Your manual selections stay in place, and you can swap or remove any suggestion.
We do not describe growth or consistency as verified when source coverage is incomplete. Backfilled records and corrected company links are not evidence of sudden business growth. Historical date selections describe historical activity. We never widen your radius or dates without your choice. Selection is based on available evidence, not payment, workmanship ratings, price or availability.
Service labels and project details
Service highlights use a shared vocabulary derived from reviewed company website information. Full published service details remain available in profiles; a highlight is not an exhaustive list. Project descriptions use exact permit identities and reviewed official permit types where available. A company's advertised services never establish the scope of an individual permit. Broad labels remain when supporting details are missing. An aerial preview shows a location, not a photograph of the contractor's work.
Recommended and Most active
Two ways to find companies for your next home project, using the area, project type and dates you choose.
Recommended
We balance customer reputation, relevant recorded work, local relevance and recent activity. Every recommendation requires verified active licensing for the trade, checked contact details and a resolved business identity. Bigger companies do not automatically lead, and similarly strong options take turns daily. Each card explains why it appears.
Most active
This view orders companies by their matching project records. Customer ratings do not change that order.
Local and nearby options
When fewer than ten businesses qualify locally, we expand progressively within one, two and five miles of the selected area. Strong nearby companies can compete alongside local matches. Nearby cards label their surrounding-area project counts and open that same area. Your map pins and exact-area totals remain tied to your original search. Proximity is measured from recorded work, not an office address.
How we balance the evidence
The starting weights are customer reputation (40%), relevant work experience (30%), local relevance (20%) and recent, sustained activity (10%). These are internal comparison measures, not public quality scores or workmanship guarantees.
Customer reputation uses a dated rating and review count matched to the correct business and branch. Counts establish confidence rather than earning a separate popularity bonus. Small samples are adjusted toward a conservative neutral reference of 4.3 stars, with the equivalent of 40 reference observations; confidence stops increasing at 500 reviews. A missing rating is neutral, not a negative review. After 90 days without a check, the rating’s influence gradually returns to neutral by 180 days. We do not infer review trends, trade-specific satisfaction, or completed jobs from aggregate ratings.
Work-experience credit has diminishing returns and reaches its maximum at 30 observations for HVAC, 24 for plumbing, 20 for electrical and solar, 12 for roofing, patios and fences, eight for pools, and 15 for other home projects. These are comparison thresholds, not licensing or competence standards. Repeated records at the same location within the same issuance date range provide one observation; distinct permits on different dates may still belong to one job. Displayed permit totals remain unchanged.
Local work receives more relevance credit than surrounding work, with distance reducing the nearby contribution gradually. Recent evidence and activity across up to six months supply the remaining activity credit. Missing source records do not establish that a business stopped working. We preserve the chosen trade, dates, property and status filters. Nearby candidates need at least three distinct eligible observations.
Only issued, completed or closed records contribute, plus unspecified-status records with separately validated issuance evidence. Known cancelled, void, expired and pending records are excluded from recommendation evidence. Our home-project filter excludes known commercial and new-construction work; unspecified property types remain labeled in the interface.
Daily rotation is limited to candidates within four points of the strongest remaining match and with comparable work-evidence and review-confidence levels. Clearly stronger matches can stay near the top. Duplicate identities and reviewed combined operations receive one opportunity. Advertising, payments, logos and clicks do not increase organic rank.
Validated record publications and rating updates automatically change the recommendation version. A visit keeps its ranking day, and pagination checks that the data version has not changed. Historical searches use past work evidence without applying today’s ratings. If project data is more than seven days old, current recommendations pause while the activity directory remains available. Existing license and contact freshness requirements remain in place.
We audit viewed positions under our privacy controls and test exposure across trades and neighborhoods. Those measurements do not automatically boost a company. Recommendations are a starting point for comparing contractors, not a certification of workmanship, insurance, price, availability or an absence of complaints. The separate Top 10 destination pages retain their documented-experience method.
Recommendation dates and regional totals
In Find companies, Recommended assesses the latest rolling year, independently of the dates you choose for project counts. Most active follows your selected dates. Recommendations still reflect the selected trade, service and location. Daily rotation occurs among similarly qualified companies; it does not guarantee a different lineup every day.
Recent permit momentum contributes at most three points and requires dated activity across multiple months, compared with the company’s own preceding baseline. Verified review growth contributes at most one point only when comparable observations from the same Google listing establish a reliable baseline. Missing or stale review history contributes no growth boost.
Across our region includes captured records beyond the initial Las Vegas map view. Moving or enlarging the map does not change those totals. Choosing a neighborhood, address radius, or Search this area changes the count scope.
Reading company activity charts
Small card charts show when work was recorded, using a separate zero-based scale for each company. The visible range states the maximum count per chart period; use project totals to compare company volume. Tap or click a chart for exact dates and counts. Faded bars mark periods partly covered by the selected dates or published data. Long histories combine adjacent periods while preserving their counts. One or two dated records use a simple timeline. Records without dates precise enough for a chart period are disclosed separately. Missing activity does not establish that a company stopped working, is available, or performs better or worse work.
How the wider directory is ordered
The Most active view orders companies by available matching records for the selected area and filters. That order measures recorded volume. It is not an editorial ranking of quality, price, reliability or suitability. Missing records and unequal source coverage limit comparisons. Review actual scopes, references and current qualifications before choosing a company.
How our project guides are written
Hey Neighbor publishes AI-assisted editorial guides to help Las Vegas Valley homeowners understand a service, compare proposals and find local companies. We use manufacturer, government, utility and business sources for their relevant claims. Business websites establish advertised services; they do not establish workmanship or independent technical review.
Each guide carries its own update date, an explanation of the latest editorial work and dated references. A design change or record refresh does not automatically reset an article’s editorial date. We distinguish illustrative scenarios from documented cases and generated editorial artwork from photographs of a company’s work. We do not imply that a licensed professional reviewed a guide unless that review actually occurred and is identified.
Corrections and editorial responsibility
Hey Neighbor maintains the directory and its explanatory guides. Reports of incorrect identity, attribution, boundaries, dates or other source discrepancies can be submitted through our correction form. Include the profile or page, the disputed detail and a supporting public source when available. Changes should follow the evidence; a correction is not a guarantee of removal of accurate public history.
Requests and commercial presentation
The comparison shortlist lets you call each company directly. Opening a dialer does not confirm a connected call; only you can mark a company as contacted. Hey Neighbor does not send your contact details or book a contractor through this shortlist. Record activity is not an endorsement, and a business appearing here does not establish a partnership with Hey Neighbor.
Editorial policy updated September 28, 2026. Source refresh dates and license review dates are reported separately.