Glossary10 terms

Entitlement & Permits

Variance, Pre-application meeting, Entitlement and 7 more, each with its own link.

Variance: A discretionary approval granted by a city's planning or zoning board that allows a property owner to deviate from a specific zoning requirement (typically setbacks, height, or lot coverage). Variances require demonstrating that strict application of the zoning code would cause undue hardship due to unique parcel conditions. Variance approval is uncertain and adds a hearing to the project timeline; how long varies by jurisdiction.
Pre-application meeting: An informal meeting with planning department staff held before submitting a formal application to confirm project requirements, flag likely issues, and discuss process. Often free or low-cost; the fee, if any, is on the city's fee schedule. Strongly recommended for any discretionary or non-standard project — a 30-minute pre-app can prevent months of iteration on fundamentally non-viable approaches. Buildability surfaces the pre-app recommendation in its AI guidance whenever a project looks likely to require discretionary review.
Entitlement: The bundle of legal approvals (zoning compliance, conditional use permits, variances, environmental review, design review, public hearings) required before a project can apply for building permits. Entitlement timelines range from a few weeks for by-right projects to multiple years for discretionary approvals with public process. Entitlement risk is one of the largest factors in development pro forma.
Entitlement path: The procedural route a project must take to earn approval. Common path types: ministerial (counter issuance when standards are met), administrative review (staff-level discretionary), board approval (planning commission or zoning board), legislative (city council or county board vote), federal or tribal review, and special districts (HOA / CCR / special improvement district). Timeline and cost vary enormously across these paths.
Rezoning (map amendment): A legislative change to the zoning designation of a specific parcel or district. Distinct from a variance — rezoning changes the underlying rules; a variance grants an exception. Rezoning requires a city council or county board vote with public hearings. Slow, politically exposed, and uncertain. Rezoning requests typically die unless they align with the city's comprehensive plan or address a broadly-supported goal like housing supply or economic development.
Site plan review: A discretionary review of a project's site layout — building placement, parking, landscaping, ingress/egress, stormwater management — typically required for non-residential, multifamily, or large single-family projects. Approval usually comes from the planning commission or staff with right of appeal. Site plan review adds time to a project and introduces public-comment risk.
Design review: An aesthetic review of a project's exterior design — materials, color, scale, compatibility with surrounding buildings. Common in historic districts, coastal zones, HOA-governed communities, and design-overlay districts. Ranges from a one-meeting staff review to a multi-hearing design review board with binding authority. Design review is subjective and uncertain, especially in aesthetically-sensitive areas.
Building permit: The approval required before construction begins. Distinct from zoning entitlement — zoning says 'what' can be built (use, size, placement); the building permit says 'how' (code compliance, structural, mechanical, electrical, plumbing). Plan check usually takes longer for commercial than for residential work; each building department publishes its own review times. Failing plan check triggers corrections (red-lines) that must be addressed before re-submittal.
CO (Certificate of Occupancy): The final approval issued by a building department certifying that a structure meets applicable codes and is legally habitable for its intended use. Required before a new or substantially renovated building can be occupied, leased, or sold. Temporary COs (TCOs) may be issued for partial occupancy during punch-list work. Failure to obtain a CO blocks move-in, invalidates most permanent financing, and exposes the owner to code-enforcement penalties.
Impact fees: Fees assessed on new development to fund infrastructure that the development burdens — schools, roads, parks, water, sewer, fire protection. Fees vary widely by jurisdiction; each city or county publishes its schedule, and no national typical range is on record here. California's AB 602 requires cities to justify fees with a nexus study; many fees have been successfully challenged for exceeding the allowed impact.

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