Almost every building project in NSW falls into one of three categories: exempt development (no approval needed), complying development (a fast-track CDC), or a full Development Application. Which one applies depends on your zoning and the controls over your specific lot, not on the type of project. EHUP checks that first, free, then prepares and lodges whatever is required and deals with council until it is determined.
The three pages below are where most people should begin. Each one covers what falls into the category, how DA, CDC and exempt development typically apply to those projects, what EHUP handles, indicative fees, and real examples with council areas and timeframes.
Exempt development means no approval is required at all, provided the work meets every one of a specific set of criteria - maximum height, floor area, distance from boundaries, and so on. Miss one criterion and it is no longer exempt.
Complying development is the fast-track pathway. A private certifier or council issues a Complying Development Certificate, usually in two to three weeks, but only where the proposal satisfies the Codes SEPP in full. No merit assessment, no neighbour notification, no discretion.
A Development Application is the merit-assessed pathway. Council weighs the proposal against the planning controls and can approve it with conditions, approve a variation, or refuse it. It is slower and it involves neighbour notification, but it is also the only pathway where a proposal that does not strictly comply can still be approved.
Once you know the pathway, the specific application type follows. Development Applications and Complying Development Certificates cover most new work. A change of use applies when the building stays the same but what happens inside it changes - retail to café, warehouse to gym. A Section 4.55 modification amends a consent you already hold. A Section 8.3 review is the formal reconsideration route after a refusal, and it has a strict deadline. And where work has already been built without approval, regularisation brings it into the system.
Every one of those has its own page with the process, timeline and cost, linked below.
You are entitled to lodge your own application, and for genuinely simple matters some people do. The value is in two specific places. First, pathway selection - lodging a full DA for something that qualified as complying development costs a month and several thousand dollars for nothing. Second, completeness - the majority of delays are requests for further information triggered by a package that was missing something predictable.
Same or next business day
Send us the address and what you want to do. We check the planning controls and tell you which pathway applies.
Within 2 business days
A written list of exactly which documents and reports your application needs, with a fixed fee for our work and council's fees shown separately.
2–4 weeks typically
Planning report or SEE, drawings, and any specialist reports coordinated on your behalf.
CDC 2–3 weeks · DA 6–10 weeks
We lodge through the Planning Portal and manage all correspondence until determination.
Most residential developments do not need a full Development Application.
Commercial and light industrial projects span a wide range - from a cafe fitout that can be certified in two to three weeks, to a warehouse development where the capital at risk makes feasibility the first priority, not documentation.
Council requires a minimum of 700m² of land for a Torrens title subdivision of a dual occupancy in an R2 zone under Campbelltown City Council. The subject property comprises 655m², a shortfall of 45m². EHUP secured development approval despite this shortfall in land size.
The residential dwelling had been used as an Islamic community centre, hosting congregational prayer, for more than 10 years. A number of unauthorised works had also been carried out to facilitate this use, and several prior applications had been rejected by Council. EHUP was engaged and successfully regularised the use of the community centre, together with all associated unauthorised structures.
It depends on the zoning of your lot, the controls in your council's Local Environmental Plan and Development Control Plan, and whether any overlay applies - heritage, bushfire, flood or acid sulfate soils. A project that is complying development on one street can require a full DA one street over. We check the property itself rather than guessing from the project type.
We lodge it. Applications go through the NSW Planning Portal, and we handle the lodgement, the fee schedule and every subsequent request for further information. Council correspondence comes to us.
That is routine, not a bad sign. Council issues a request for further information and we respond on your behalf, usually within a week. Applications that are prepared properly get fewer of these, which is the main reason a well-assembled package is determined faster.
Yes. We are based in Lakemba but work across the Sydney metropolitan area, including Georges River, Bayside, Inner West, Cumberland, Liverpool, Parramatta, Blacktown, Ryde, Penrith and the Sutherland Shire.
A Development Application is the merit-assessed approval pathway.
A Complying Development Certificate is the fast-track approval pathway.
A change of use application is needed when the building stays the same but what happens inside it changes - retail to cafe, warehouse to gym, office to medical suite.
Tell us the address and what you want to do. We'll help identify the appropriate planning pathway, whether it is exempt development, complying development or a full DA. Your first conversation is free.