Issuing a building consent

Once your building consent is issued by Horowhenua District Council you'll receive the following documentation:

  • The building consent (form 5).
  • Approved plans and specifications.
  • A letter confirming issue of the building consent and useful information about matters which you need to comply with while undertaking your building project. This letter also contains a list of inspections required during the building process.
  • Attachments relating to any certificate issued with the consent eg a Development Contributions Notice or a Section 37 Certificate

It's very important that you (and your contractors) read the Building Consent documentation to ensure you're clear about the requirements.

If you have applied for your consent through the Simpli online portal, these documents will be returned to you through the portal.

Complaints

Horowhenua District Council is a registered and accredited Building Consent Authority (BCA) and is required to have a publicly available complaints policy in relation to building consenting functions.

BCA Complaints Policy(PDF, 107KB)

Starting work on your project

Building work that requires a building consent may not commence until the building consent has been issued (and a resource consent obtained if required). If the consented works require a resource consent and one hasn’t yet been obtained, your consent will be issued with a Section 37 Certificate attached to it.

The Section 37 Certificate will either state that no building works can proceed until a resource consent has been obtained or it will state the extent to which building works can proceed until a resource consent it obtained.

Lapsed consents

Section 52 of the Building Act 2004 requires that a Building Consent shall “lapse and be of no further effect” if work has not commenced within 12 months after the date of issue.

For this reason, we send out a letter at eleven (11) months advising the owner that this point is nearing and that we have no record of the work commencing. The letter asks the owner to advise that work has commenced. If no response is received, the consent will be given a status of “lapsed” meaning that a new consent will be required for any future work.

Development Contributions

Some building consents will attract development contributions, more information about this can be found on our Development Contributions page.

Related Information

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