I am still getting this on my ubuntu system:

xenocampanoli@delllap:~$ pip install numpy
Collecting numpy
  Using cached numpy-1.12.1-cp27-cp27mu-manylinux1_x86_64.whl
Installing collected packages: numpy
Exception:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/basecommand.py", line 215, in main
    status = self.run(options, args)
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/commands/install.py", line 342, in run
    prefix=options.prefix_path,
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/req/req_set.py", line 784, in install
    **kwargs
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/req/req_install.py", line 851, in install
    self.move_wheel_files(self.source_dir, root=root, prefix=prefix)
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/req/req_install.py", line 1064, in move_wheel_files
    isolated=self.isolated,
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/wheel.py", line 345, in move_wheel_files
    clobber(source, lib_dir, True)
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/wheel.py", line 287, in clobber
    ensure_dir(dest)  # common for the 'include' path
  File "/home/xenocampanoli/.local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/pip/utils/__init__.py", line 83, in ensure_dir
    os.makedirs(path)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/os.py", line 157, in makedirs
    mkdir(name, mode)
OSError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages'