Rules
Part of Zoning and permits are three separate systems that nobody else in the deal owns
A four-stage zoning and permits review for one address
A zoning and permits review for one address: check local rules, identify approvals, get written answers, and record a proceed, condition, or stop decision.
Before you commit to an address, run a zoning and permits review. It is a bounded piece of work with a decision at the end. Formal applications, required studies, or consultant work can add costs, so finding a problem now is good news.
This page is the procedure. It assumes you have a shortlist and a description of what you intend to do.
What to take away
- The review has four stages and produces one of three verdicts: proceed, proceed with the condition priced in, or stop.
- Every question goes to the office that decides, in writing, with the activity described in full.
- The review is worthless unless the deal can still change. Run it before the letter of intent, not after.
Stage one: what you are proposing
Write it once, in plain terms, and do not soften it.
Describe the activity once
- Activity, not industry label
- Hours, deliveries, night operations
- People on site at peak
- Vehiclestype, number, timing, waiting
- Stored goods, quantities, outdoor items
- Noise, smell, dust, heat, waste
- Build changesfloor area, walls, exits
This document is the input to every question that follows. If it changes, the review restarts.
Stage two: what the address already is
- Find the parcel on the municipality's zoning map and note the district.
- Read the district's use table in the local zoning ordinance or zoning code and find your activity. Note whether it is permitted outright, requires a conditional or special use approval, or is not listed; ask the planning or zoning department how an unlisted use is classified.
- Read the performance standards attached to the districtnoise at the boundary, hours, lighting, odor, outdoor storage, screening.
- Read the parking and loading requirements and run the calculation for your activity, not for the last one. Confirm the applicable figures in the local code rather than assuming another property's requirements apply.
- Ask the building department what the space was last approved as, and whether a certificate of occupancy or building permit records are available.
- On a purchase, add a title search and a survey, because recorded rights across a site do not appear on a marketing plan. The word to look for is easement, and the related power that can affect a site later is eminent domain.
Two hours of map and table reading is enough to tell you whether the rest of the review is likely to be easy or hard.
Stage three: the written questions
Send a written question to each office with a role in approving the use. Start with the municipality's planning or zoning department and building department; depending on the proposed use and local rules, also contact the fire marshal and health department. If an appeal or zoning relief may be needed, ask whether the zoning board of appeals or board of adjustment handles it; those names and responsibilities vary by jurisdiction. Attach your description from stage one and ask specific questions with yes or no answers where possible.
Ask which approvals apply at this address. Depending on local code and the proposed work, these may include a conditional use permit (sometimes called a special use permit), a variance, site plan review, a building permit, or a certificate of occupancy. Ask the responsible office for the official application form and filing checklist; do not assume an approval from one office replaces another.
Who to ask and what
Office
- Land use
- Permitted here, under what conditions
- Building
- Approved as what, which codes, upgrade triggers
- Fire
- What this building needs given storage
- Health
- What review applies, in what order
- Environmental
- Do discharges, emissions, waste need permits
- Transport
- Is access acceptable, assessment required
- Signage
- Separate consent needed, how long
Question that matters
- Land use
- Building
- Fire
- Health
- Environmental
- Transport
- Signage
Ask every one of them the same secondary question: how long are your reviews taking at the moment. That answer is what turns a permission review into a program.
For excavation, contact 811, the U.S. call-before-you-dig number, which routes the request to the applicable one-call notification center. Follow that center's instructions; utility locating is separate from the other reviews and is described at call before you dig.
Stage four: the verdict
Sort every answer into one of three boxes. Use the most restrictive outcome that applies: proceed only when the use is allowed and applicable standards are met; proceed with a condition priced when approval or work remains, the route is available, and its cost and timing work; stop when the use is barred or the approval route cannot meet the project's constraints.
Sort every answer
Is the activity permitted and are standards met?
Proceed: attach confirmations and move on
Yes with conditions -> Price money and time, negotiate in letter of intent
Proceed. The activity is permitted, the standards are met, the queue is tolerable. Attach the confirmations to the file and move on.
Proceed with the condition priced. The answer is yes subject to something: an alteration, an application, a study, a committee. Price the money and the time, then decide who carries it. This is a negotiation, and it belongs in the letter of intent rather than in your budget alone.
Stop. The activity is not permitted, or the route to permission is longer than the business can wait. Ask what would change the answer and how long that takes, then walk away with a clear head.
The verdict has to be able to change the deal. The mechanisms for that, and the wording that makes a lease depend on an approval, are in zoning and permits and in commercial leasing.
What the review does not cover
- Whether the building physically suits you. That is a separate exercise, and for a floor it starts with the questions in office space.
- Whether the location works commercially. The method for that is in location selection.
- Whether the construction is affordable. The buckets to budget are in tenant improvements.
Keeping these separate matters, because a permission problem and a building problem have different solutions and mixing them produces a decision nobody can explain later.
The file you end up with
- Your activity description, dated.
- The district, the use table entry, and the performance standards.
- One written reply from each office, naming the address.
- The current review times, dated, because they move.
- A one-line verdict with the conditions listed underneath it.
That file is worth keeping for the whole term. It is what you reach for when somebody asks why the space is laid out the way it is, and what you hand to a lawyer if the position is ever challenged.
Common questions
How long does the review take?
The reading is a day. The written answers take as long as the offices take, and that is itself information about how the rest of the project will go.
Should I do this on every address on the shortlist?
Do stage two on all of them, because it is cheap and it eliminates the obvious. Do stages three and four on the one or two you would actually sign.
Who should run it?
Whoever will live with the answer. It can be delegated, but the person deciding should read the replies themselves rather than a summary of them.
What if an office will not answer?
Ask again, narrowly, with a specific question rather than an open one. If you still get nothing, that silence is a fact about the project timetable, and it belongs in the risk you are pricing rather than in the optimism.
