Electrician in Lakewood

What we do in Lakewood

Everything we do in Lakewood, with what each job usually involves here. The photos are from our own jobs.

Panel upgrades in Lakewood

Main panel and service upgrades for 1950s Lakewood houses, with the city's OpenGov permit, any plan check and SCE's portal request coordinated before the change-out.

More on panel upgradesCall (844) 430-7681

EV charger installation in Lakewood

Home EV chargers in Lakewood, starting with a load calculation, because original 1950s services were not designed with a car charger in mind and may not have room for one.

More on EV charger installationCall (844) 430-7681

Electrical repair & troubleshooting in Lakewood

Finding the cause of dead circuits, warm outlets and tripping breakers in Lakewood houses that have been remodelled several times since the 1950s.

More on electrical repair & troubleshootingCall (844) 430-7681

Rewiring in Lakewood

Rewiring for Lakewood's tract houses, from a single room or a converted garage to the whole house, with grounded circuits run where the original wiring lacks a ground.

More on rewiringCall (844) 430-7681

Lighting & ceiling fans in Lakewood

Recessed, kitchen and exterior lighting and ceiling fans for Lakewood homes where ceiling boxes and switch wiring may date back to the original construction.

More on lighting & ceiling fansCall (844) 430-7681

Outlets, GFCI & new circuits in Lakewood

Grounded outlets in place of two-prong ones, GFCI protection, and new 240-volt circuits for heat pumps, dryers and induction ranges in houses wired long before they existed.

More on outlets, GFCI & new circuitsCall (844) 430-7681

Commercial electrical in Lakewood

Tenant improvements, lighting and dedicated circuits for restaurants, shops and offices around Lakewood Center and along Lakewood, Bellflower and Del Amo Boulevards.

More on commercial electricalCall (844) 430-7681

Also: subpanels, dedicated circuits, 240-volt outlets for dryers and ranges, exterior and security lighting, hard-wired smoke alarms, and small repairs of every kind.

Working in Lakewood

Infinity Electrical is a licensed electrical contractor for panel and service upgrades, EV charger circuits, rewiring, troubleshooting and commercial work in the City of Lakewood. Electrical permits there come from the City of Lakewood's Building & Safety staff, and Southern California Edison owns the wires and the meter and also supplies the power, because Lakewood is not a Clean Power Alliance city.

Lakewood was farmland until 1949, when the Montana Ranch, a spread of dairies, hay fields and hog farms on a 1944 land-use map, was sold to the Lakewood Park Corporation. That company was an alliance of three men: Louis Boyar of Aetna Construction, S. Mark Taper of Biltmore Homes, and the developer Ben Weingart. The first foundations went in on February 24, 1950. By the city's own account, crews of about 4,000 workers moved down each street like an assembly line, finishing as many as 40 to 60 houses a day, and the empty fields became 17,500 houses in less than three years.

The pace mattered for the wiring. Houses in a tract were built to the same plans, and their original wiring was likely sized for the appliances of the early 1950s, not for today's loads; houses from that decade still make up most of Lakewood's housing. For a Lakewood house, the useful questions are usually the same ones: how much of the original service is left, what has already been changed, and whether the panel can carry what the owner wants to add next. A licensed electrician, such as Infinity Electrical Inc. (CSLB #1100231), can answer those on site.

What's common in Lakewood homes

Lakewood's 2025-2029 fair housing analysis, using state Department of Finance figures, counts 28,043 homes in 2024: 23,114 single-family detached houses, 1,124 attached units, 3,717 apartments and 88 mobile homes. About 73% of households own their homes, and, by 2023 Census survey estimates cited in the analysis, 62.3% of the housing stock was built in the 1950s.

• The 1950-1953 Lakewood Park houses. The Lakewood Park Corporation built in three phases: Lakewood Park in 1950, Lakewood Mutual Homes from late 1951 and Carson Park in 1952, with two- and three-bedroom plans by former FHA architect Paul J. Duncan. A house from those years may still have a small original service, and some circuits may have no equipment ground. Before adding a heat pump, an induction range or a car charger, a load calculation shows whether a panel upgrade has to come first.
• Older and later tracts. Not every Lakewood house came from the big three. The city's history names Lakewood Gardens (Paul Trousdale, 1946, just under 500 homes), homes east of Bellflower Boulevard from 1942, the Imperial Estates tracts (1958-1962), Sunshine Homes (1961-1963) and Cherry Cove (1968). The eastern neighbourhoods were built mainly from 1957 to 1963, so a house east of the 605 can be a decade younger than one near Lakewood Center, with different wiring behind its walls.
• Decades of owner changes. Seventy years of remodels, garage projects and room additions mean a Lakewood house rarely matches the plans it was built from. The city's fair housing analysis flags unauthorized rentals, often in illegally converted garages, as a possible health and safety problem. When a garage or addition has been wired without a permit, rewiring that section, rather than adding to it, is often the safer starting point.
• Backyard units. The same analysis attributes most of Lakewood's housing growth from 2018 to 2024 to accessory dwelling units, and the city runs a Pre-Approved ADU Program. A new unit usually needs a feeder or subpanel from the main house, which brings the original service size straight back into question.
• Apartments and renters. Roughly 27% of Lakewood households rent, and the city counts 3,325 units in buildings of five or more. Owners and managers of older buildings usually call about tripping breakers, GFCI protection in kitchens and laundry rooms, and dead outlets.
• Lakewood Center and the boulevards. Lakewood Center opened in 1951 and was planned on 154 acres, or 260 with parking, according to the city. Most of the city's almost 3,000 businesses sit along Lakewood, Bellflower and Del Amo Boulevards and Carson and South Streets, where restaurants, offices and stores need tenant lighting, dedicated circuits and panel work.

Permits and power in Lakewood

The City of Lakewood (ZIP codes 90712, 90713 and 90715 for most addresses (Lakewood also uses 90711, 90714, 90716 and part of 90805)) covers 9.5 square miles in southern Los Angeles County, about 23 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles. Long Beach wraps around it on the west, northwest and south, Bellflower lies to the north, Cerritos to the northeast, Hawaiian Gardens to the southeast, and Cypress, across the county line in Orange County, to the east. The San Gabriel River Freeway (I-605) cuts through the eastern side of the city.

Lakewood or Long Beach? The city name on a mailing address does not settle which city a house is in. In 1953, before Lakewood incorporated, the residents of Lakewood Village voted by just 79 votes to join Long Beach, and two Lakewood Plaza neighbourhoods also went to Long Beach that year. Lakewood Village is still a Long Beach neighbourhood today, bounded by Del Amo Boulevard, Carson Street, Lakewood Boulevard and Bellflower Boulevard and surrounded by the City of Lakewood on three sides. ZIP 90712 also reaches into Lakewood Village and North Long Beach. A house on one of those streets answers to Long Beach's building department, not Lakewood's, so the parcel's city is worth checking first.

The original contract city. Lakewood voted to incorporate on March 9, 1954, and became a city on April 16, 1954, the first new city in Los Angeles County since 1939. Rather than build its own departments, it bought most services by contract from the county and from private firms. That arrangement became known as the Lakewood Plan, and the city says about a quarter of California's cities now work the same way. Building and safety work has since moved: the city now names a private firm for it.

Who handles a Lakewood permit today. The city's Building & Safety page now says those services are provided for Lakewood by TRB+ Associates, a private firm that supports plan check, permitting and inspections, working from the Community Development Department at City Hall on Clark Avenue. Most permit applications and plan check submittals go through the city's OpenGov online permit center, and the city lists electrical work among the residential projects that often need a permit. One county link remains: the city's permit page says records for permits issued since 2008 can be viewed through L.A. County. When a Lakewood house has a panel that someone already replaced, finding the record helps us tell a permitted change from an unpermitted one.

Inspections and plan check. At the time of writing, the city lists online inspection requests as coming soon, so inspections are booked with Building & Safety by phone, and the city's contact page says inspectors are available early in the morning by appointment. Some work needs Building Plan Check approval before a permit can be issued. A like-for-like panel change and a larger job with new circuits or a new service location may follow different paths, and the city decides which one applies. The permit, plan check and inspections are coordinated as part of the job.

Edison's part of a service upgrade. Lakewood's resident guide lists Southern California Edison for electric service and SoCalGas for natural gas. Lakewood is not on Clean Power Alliance's list of member communities, so SCE normally supplies the energy as well as delivering it. Whatever the supplier, panel and meter work goes through SCE. A panel upgrade or meter spot on an existing service is requested through SCE's Building, Renovation and Project Planning Portal, while moving or removing SCE equipment is arranged by phone. We line up the SCE request with the city's permit and final inspection so the disconnect and reconnect happen in the right order.

Lakewood's own water company. One more local oddity: the city runs its own water utility, having bought the Lakewood Water and Power Company in 1959, though Golden State Water serves the 90715 ZIP. Despite the old company's name, the city does not supply electricity. The water service matters to an electrician mainly for bonding, because where the water pipe enters the house is one of the things checked during a panel change.

The permits and utilities guide explains the whole picture for the three counties we serve.

Around Lakewood

Lakewood's neighbours all run their own permit offices, and the power supplier changes from one border to the next. Long Beach, which surrounds much of Lakewood, has its own Building and Safety Bureau and an Express Permit Service that covers many like-for-like and up-to-200-amp electrical service jobs, though not in its historic districts or coastal zone. Hawaiian Gardens' own Building & Safety Division issues permits there, and Cerritos issues electrical permits through its city Building & Safety Division. Hawaiian Gardens is a Clean Power Alliance member, as are Paramount and Downey a little farther northwest, so bills there normally show CPA for the energy. Bellflower and Cerritos are not on CPA's list, and neither is Norwalk. Cypress is across the county line in Orange County.

• Long Beach
• Bellflower
• Cerritos
• Hawaiian Gardens
• Cypress
• Paramount
• Downey
• Norwalk

See the full list of areas we cover across Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties.