Obtaining a Building Consent is a fairly straightforward process, but for someone who does not have too much experience with plans, council or building it can appear complicated. Therefore I take the process cautiously, and make sure you are well aware of everything that is needed, and try to give you the most accurate costs and realistic timeframes.

This is the typical process to get you a Building Consent, ultimately so you can build.

1. I get an enquiry from someone who has a brief or fairly good idea of what they want to do.

• Eg, Addition, new build, minor alteration, etc.

2. I reply (usually by email) with an approximate cost of my fees that I have charged from previous similar jobs. I also try my best to give estimated costs on any other consultant I may see that is needed.

• Eg, council fees, structural engineers, etc.

This ensures that everyone is on the same page regarding possible costs.

3. If the estimates are in range I then organise a time to meet on site. I usually go through a checklist and just have a look at what is happening, and to see if there are going to be any additional issues (from my experience).

4. From there I go back to the office and try to get a quote to do the work within a few days (as to not waste your time).

So far no strings attached. If you want to go elsewhere and pick the brains of others or if you want to get costs/prices off others, that is very understandable.

Quotes

Depending on my observations, and what you are after I can break my quote into different stages.  This is the process I recommend to everyone but can be discussed further depending on the job.

There are 2 stages in my quote.

• Design Stage ( Approx. 25% of total fee )
• Building Consent Stage –  ( Approx. 75% of total fee )

Design Stage

Depending on type of job (new or alteration/addition) drawings will be produced for:

• Site Plan [Existing and Proposed]
• Floor Plans [Existing and Proposed]
• Elevations [Existing and Proposed]

Meeting with Council duty planners, help desk and development engineers. Try to uncover any other additional issues that may arise in the process. This is where we can find out if the planned design may need resource consent.

Resource Consent is a different section to Building Consent. It is when you encroach on a properties site restrictions.  For ease, if there is a max height line on a property of 8m, and the current design is over 8m, that will need a resource consent. Most of my clients I deal with try to avoid this, as it is extra costs and extra time. I have added more on resource consents at the bottom (also to note, the design stage plans are usually ok for use in obtaining a Resource Consent)

Now with this set of initial draft plans you can get estimates from all consultants and parties that may be involved

Builders – they should be able to supply a good estimate from these plans
Engineers (structural, civil, fire, etc) – If any issues arise from my meeting on site
It is a good start to find out costs involved before paying me my full fee, paying council fees and then at the end realising that the build will cost too much.

Once all this info is obtained, we meet again and asses what needs to be done in order to get a Building Consent. It is at this stage you can choose to stop work or continue for the Building Consent stage. Work begins on a complete set of working drawings, specification, and multiple forms needed for lodgement to Council.

Building Consent Stage

Now this is where I take the initial draft plans and get them ready for lodgement. Depending on what was uncovered in the initial site investigation and design stage, I work with whatever consultants were needed and get the plans into council.
This is where all the detail comes in;
Stud sizes, details, bracing design, cross-sections, specifications, purlin fixings, lintel sizes, joist layout, etc etc. Basically what a builder will use on site.

Now Alternatively
If you are confident about consultants involved, costs of the build and not worried about planning or service issues, I can draw up to your design with spec out of the building code and 3604 lodge it and see what council come back with.

Council Process
When I lodge the consent at Council it will go through 2 parts Lodgement and Processing.

Lodgement
These people check the documents and make sure all the basic info is there. They, at this stage may ask for a couple extra bits of information but nothing too dramatic. (usually)

Processing
This is the major part of the whole lodgement at council.

At processing the plans are looked at by 3 sections; Planning, Services and Building

– Planning These people will let you know of any encroachments of site restrictions (height to boundary, site coverages, max height restrictions, etc), which will mean either re-design or resource consent, but the original Design Stage should have taken care of any issues there prior.

– Services (stormwater and wastewater disposal) If you have public wastewater and public stormwater connections on site and not building near them, then should have no issues there. For example, If you are on soakage for stormwater, some steps need to be taken here. Existing soak hole testing, maybe new hole drilled and then eventual soak chamber built. Costs up to and around $5000. Once again, we try to address this in the Design Stage part of the job so no big surprises.

– Building (the bulk of the plans, and where most of my work is involved) They check structure, water tightness, details, specifications, bracing, basically everything about the new build being drawn to the building code and 3604. If any work is outside of that scope, then structural engineer is involved.

So whilst processing these 3 sections, council members may require further information (RFI), they will send me a letter or email or both, they may also send one to the client as to let them know the clock is stopped. Every time council ask for something they stop the clock on their ‘20 working day’ timeline for building consent processing. I always tell the client to wait 2 months for council processing to be on the safe side.

These RFI letters usually take a couple hours to gather info and send it back. But it could involve other issues that require other consultants, for example, a detail was not provided from a structural engineer, so this does take extra time.