Site Check
Zoning, the mapped controls and the red flags for a single address, in plain English. The first step of every job.
$600
incl. GST · 3 business days
Sydney & NSW planning advisoryTenth year · since 2017
Know what your site can become.
What can I build on a 650 m² block in Earlwood, a corner lot in Ryde, an R2 site near a station, or the backyard behind my semi?
Planning-led feasibility and approvals for developers, builders and investors working on small to mid-scale sites across Sydney and NSW. Spend on architects and consultants only once you know the site stacks up.
Coverage
34
councils across six Sydney and NSW regions
Reply
2 days
to reply to every new enquiry, counting business days
Price
$600
Site Check, GST inclusive
Fees
Fixed
fees, agreed in writing before work starts
Pathways mapped
One site. Three ways to develop it.
Most of the sites that come to whatcani.build start the same way: one lot, one house. Here is what it could become, and the planning pathway each option usually takes.
1 of 4
Original home
The house on your site today.
Starting point · the zoning and controls that apply to it are read first.
The approach
Five questions behind every site.
The practice is named after the question every owner asks. Behind it sit five more, worked through on every site, from feasibility to delivery.
01 FeasibilityWhat can I build on this site?
02 Design qualityWhat should I build to make the site work well?
03 ResponsibilityWhat can I build that works for more people?
04 StrategyWhat can we build across this precinct?
05 ImplementationHow can competing interests be reconciled?
How it works
From an address to a clear answer.
01
Send your site
An address, a concept, or a problem. No formal brief required.
02
Your site is assessed
Zoning, the LEP and DCP controls, a realistic building envelope and yield, checked against what councils are approving in practice.
03
You get a call
A go, pause or stop call, with the reasoning, the key numbers and a plain-English next step.
04
You move, efficiently
Brief your architect, builder or lender with exactly what they need.
Services and fees
Fixed fees, one straight answer.
Every job starts with a Site Check, and each service builds on the one before. Fees include GST and are agreed in writing before work starts.
Feasibility & Options
Up to three options tested against the controls, a realistic yield and the smarter pathway: a development application (DA) to council, or a faster complying development certificate (CDC). It ends with a go, pause or stop.
$1,700–$3,900
incl. GST · 5–7 business days
Design Brief
The controls for your chosen option, turned into an envelope and a brief your architect can pick up and run with.
$1,600–$2,500
incl. GST · 4–6 business days
Approval Package
A lodgement-ready DA or CDC. For a DA: the Statement of Environmental Effects (the report council assesses) and a clause 4.6 variation (a written case to depart from a control) where needed, lodged through the NSW Planning Portal.
$3,000–$7,900
incl. GST · scoped per project
After lodgement: Assessment Support answers council’s requests and any objections through to the decision. $900 a round incl. GST, or $1,500 where amended plans or objections are involved.
Front fence to back fence is part of every Feasibility & Options, Design Brief and Approval Package: the practice’s own 16-question check on how a project works for residents, neighbours and the street. Read the checklist
Working across several sites? Advisory retainers start from $800 a month, for regular planning input without engaging project by project. Retainer details
The practice
The planners you'll be dealing with.
We started whatcani.build after watching too many good projects come unstuck early. Not because the site was wrong, but because the planning advice turned up too late. In 2027 we mark ten years of getting it in first.
Istvan Bakos
Principal, Planning & FeasibilityIstvan leads planning and feasibility. He came up through architecture and urban design before moving into planning strategy, and works directly with developers and builders on zoning, feasibility, and the clause 4.6 and policy arguments that get good projects through council.
NSW Planning SystemFeasibility StrategySEPP & LEP PolicyUrban Design
Nathan Evans
Principal, Design & ApprovalsNathan reads plans, sections and massing fluently enough to pick up planning issues while a scheme can still be changed cheaply. He leads the pre-design and approvals work, from envelope testing through to DA and CDC lodgement.
DA / CDC ApprovalsEnvelope TestingCouncil Coordination
Client outcomes
What working with whatcani.build looks like
Corner site, Earlwood, Canterbury-Bankstown
Site about 650 m² · Development application (DA)
An owner-developer three weeks from exchange needed to know whether the R3 zoning would carry four townhouses. Tested against the Canterbury-Bankstown DCP setbacks, the envelope gave a realistic yield of three, with a DA risk profile their lender could work with.
ThreeRealistic yield, not four
6 daysTurnaround
Pre-exchangeAdvice landed
“We were three weeks from exchange on a corner site in Earlwood and needed to know whether the R3 zoning would carry four townhouses. The feasibility review came back in six business days: a realistic yield of three, not four. We bought at the right price because of it.”Owner-developer · Earlwood, Canterbury-Bankstown, 2025
“The pre-design brief reset the envelope against the Ryde LEP before the redesign, and the second scheme went through without a single amended plan. It saved us roughly $15,000 in abortive design fees.”Residential builder · Ryde, 2025
Where whatcani.build works
34 councils, from the Central Coast to the Illawarra.
Grouped into six regions that follow the NSW Government’s Greater Sydney planning districts. Each has its own pressures, from heritage streets to bushfire-prone blocks.
- Inner Sydney & Eastern SuburbsCity of Sydney, Inner West, Canada Bay, Burwood, Strathfield, Randwick, Waverley, Woollahra, Bayside9 councils
- North Shore & Northern BeachesNorth Sydney, Mosman, Lane Cove, Willoughby, Hunters Hill, Ryde, Ku-ring-gai, Hornsby, Northern Beaches9 councils
- Southern SydneyCanterbury-Bankstown, Georges River, Sutherland Shire3 councils
- Parramatta & North West SydneyParramatta, Cumberland, Blacktown, The Hills4 councils
- Western Sydney & MacarthurPenrith, Fairfield, Liverpool, Campbelltown, Camden, Wollondilly, Blue Mountains7 councils
- Central Coast & IllawarraCentral Coast, Wollongong2 councils
Knowledge hub
Latest articles
Plain-language guides to NSW planning, published as they’re ready.
Get in touch
Talk to us about your site.
Send us the address and a few lines on what you're weighing up. We'll reply by email within two business days, free of charge. Our fees are fixed, GST-inclusive and priced for small and mid-scale developers.
Go to full contact page