Updated December 2024
The consent process for minor dwellings (AKA Granny Flats) has been brought to the spotlight recently due to proposed new legislation from the national government to streamline the building of small dwellings by removing the requirement for Building Consent. This legislation has yet to come to law so we have put together the following information to answer all your questions about what needs Building or Resource Consent currently and how this could be affected by the proposed new laws. If you're not clear or just want some reassurance feel free to get in touch for personalised advice.
Currently, all buildings with plumbing services and/or exceeding 30m2 require building consent.
If your proposed project is less than 30m2, is further from any boundary than its own height, and does not have any plumbing, you are able to build this without Building Consent so long as it is designed by an LBP (Licensed Building Practitioner) Designer or CPEng (Chartered Professional Engineer) and to be constructed out of lightweight materials. Construction must be supervised by an LBP builder and adhere to the NZ Building Codes.
Though you do not need Building Consent you still need to notify council of your new structure and submit an updated site plan and working drawings.
Resource Consent is required when what you wish to build or where you wish to build it does not fall within what is allowed in your regional district plan.
Some of the typical rules that effect small dwellings include:
• Site Coverage
• Offset from Boundary
• Height to Boundary Recession
These rules vary from region to region so it’s best to get in touch for personalised advice.
Note that the proposed new laws surrounding 'Granny Flats' may affect this by looking to create blanket rules for all of New Zealand but these have yet to confirmed.
While there is no guarantee on what will be included in the final legislation that is made into law this is the latest information available on what the proposed new rules allows.
The general idea is that you will be able to build one detached self-contained home on your land near your main dwelling without needing resource consent or building consent. This streamlines the process of building a granny flat saving you time and money.
There are, of course, criteria that need to be met such as:
These changes are slated to come into effect mid 2025.
When a new house is built it increases the density of whichever city it’s built in. This adds to the load on public infrastructure, community services and the need for recreational spaces.
To help cover the cost of these investments (and relieve other ratepayers from covering them) some councils will charge development levies. For councils who do enforce development levies these are typically calculated based on how your property is zoned and the size of your new home.
In our experience development levies often come as a surprise to customers so it’s best to talk with your local Pzazz Homes builder about these in the early stages. They will be able to give you an indicative range you can expect to pay in development levies for your new home.
As an example, Hutt City Council has a district-wide minimum development contribution of $13,984 incl. GST for each new dwelling on a site. Based on your suburb you then may pay additional fees; currently, rural residents have no additional fees, however if you are a resident of Wainuiomata you have an additional $24,514.00 to pay, bringing your total development contribution to $38,498.00 incl. GST. Not exactly loose change!
Development levies are typically triggered during the building consent stage so it is yet unclear how/when they will be triggered in the proposed new ‘Granny Flat Legislation’
The first step of both building and resource consent is typically to have a qualified draftsman or architect generate and collate the necessary drawings and documents based on the desired design. Depending on the complexity of your project this could take between 3 weeks and 3 months.
If you need both a resource consent and building consent it is prudent to work through the resource consent process first to ensure the feasibility of the project and understand any parameters the design needs to work within.
Once your application has been submitted there may be some back and forth between the council, your draftsman/architect and yourself to ensure that the design meets all the requirements of the building codes and other relevant regulations.
For new small homes we estimate an average council processing time of four weeks. This will vary from council to council and their current workload.
In most instances building consent fees are calculated based on the value of the project. Again, this will vary from council to council but in our experience for a small self-contained dwelling we would expect these to be in the range of $3-4,000. Resource consent vary a lot in terms of their complexity so the fee structure is typically based on the hourly fees for the council expertise involved + administrative costs. These fees are usually available on your local council’s website.
Keep in mind that these are only the fees payable to council, in association with this work you will likely also have draftsman/architect fees and may also need to engage other specialists such as geotechnical engineers, surveyors, the design of trusses, and, if the geotechnical report requires it, specially engineered foundations.