Section 10.7 Planning Certificate NSW: What It Tells You Before You Buy or Design

If you are buying a property, planning a renovation, testing a granny flat, or looking at a dual occupancy site, one document deserves attention before you spend real money on design: the Section 10.7 Planning Certificate.

A Section 10.7 planning certificate, previously known as a Section 149 certificate, is an official council-issued document about the planning controls and constraints that apply to a parcel of land. In NSW, anyone can buy one, and a basic section 10.7(2) certificate must be attached to a contract of sale. The NSW Planning Portal says the certificate covers zoning, planning instruments and policies, planning controls, and hazards and risks affecting the land.

In plain English: it tells you whether the block is straightforward, constrained, or likely to become expensive and slow once approvals start.

What is a Section 10.7 Planning Certificate?

There are two main versions.

A Section 10.7(2) certificate shows the property’s zoning, relevant state, regional and local planning controls, and constraints such as contamination, flooding and bushfire-prone land. A Section 10.7(2) and 10.7(5) certificate includes that same core information plus other relevant information council may hold, including advice from other authorities and certain additional matters affecting the land. Under the EP&A Act, councils may include “other relevant matters” they are aware of in the 10.7(5) version.

That second certificate is often the smarter choice when a site looks even slightly tricky.

Why this matters before you buy

A lot of buyers spend hours on floorplans, builder pricing and rental numbers before they have done the most basic planning due diligence.

That is backwards.

Before you buy, a 10.7 certificate can reveal whether the land is affected by flood, bushfire, contamination or other planning controls that may change what you can build, how you design it, whether you can use the CDC pathway, or whether you are heading for a slower DA process instead. Some councils also note that the certificate can state whether complying development can be carried out on the land.

If you are comparing two sites that look similar on real estate photos, the 10.7 is often where the difference shows up.

What a 10.7 certificate can tell you

At a practical level, this document can help you answer questions like:

• What zone is the land in?
• Which planning instruments and policies apply?
• Are there flood, bushfire or contamination flags?
• Is complying development potentially available on the land?
• Are there additional council-held planning issues that need review? That is why it is so useful early. It does not just tell you what the land is called on a map. It tells you what planning framework you are stepping into.

For owners and developers, that can be the difference between:

• designing for CDC from day one, or
• realising late that the site needs a DA, specialist reports, and a different project brief.

What a 10.7 certificate does not tell you

This is the part many people miss.

A 10.7 certificate is not a development approval. Councils also warn that while it identifies the planning documents that apply to a property, it does not spell out all the detailed development standards or the full terms of those instruments.

So no, a 10.7 does not mean:

• your granny flat is approved,
• your duplex is feasible,
• your renovation will sail through CDC, or
• your concept will satisfy setbacks, landscaping, privacy, stormwater or building-code requirements. It is a trigger document, not the whole due-diligence exercise.

That is also why the best workflow is: 10.7 certificate first, then site feasibility, then design brief.

Why it matters before you design

A lot of wasted design fees come from solving the wrong problem.

If the 10.7 flags flood affectation, bushfire-prone land, heritage-related constraints, or other planning sensitivities, your designer needs to know that before sketching options. The same applies if you are aiming for a Complying Development Certificate and want to avoid designing something that later falls out of code compliance. Planland’s existing CDC content already treats the 10.7 as an early feasibility document: your October 2025 CDC guide says step 2 is to confirm whether CDC is permissible on the land using the 10.7 certificate + Spatial Viewer, and your January 2026 CDC checklist says the 10.7 is used to confirm zoning, CDC eligibility and site sensitivities.

That is exactly the right positioning.

10.7 and the CDC vs DA decision

One of the best uses of the 10.7 is to help you choose the right approval pathway early.

Your existing DA vs CDC in NSW article explains the core split well: a DA is usually better where the site is tricky or the design needs flexibility, while a CDC works when the site is straightforward and the proposal fits strict standards. Your dual occupancy guide makes the same point for duplex-style projects, noting that dual occ sites often need a careful DA-vs-CDC review because flooding, bushfire, heritage and other constraints can change the pathway.

That is why the 10.7 matters so much. It helps you stop asking, “Can I build what I want?” and start asking the more useful question: “What approval path is realistic on this block?”

Section 10.7(2) or 10.7(2) and (5): which one should you get?

For straightforward sale-contract purposes, the basic certificate may be enough.

But if you are doing serious pre-purchase due diligence, testing a dual occupancy, trying to hold a project inside CDC, or looking at a site with any hint of flooding, bushfire, odd planning history or council overlays, the fuller certificate is often the better spend.

The reason is simple: early clarity is cheaper than redesign.

A practical workflow before you spend on plans

Here is the order I would recommend for most NSW residential projects:

1. Order the 10.7 certificate

This gives you the official planning baseline from council. Under the EP&A Act, a person may apply to council for a planning certificate for land in that council area, and council must issue it as soon as practicable.

2. Pull the Spatial Viewer property report

Service NSW points users to the NSW Spatial Viewer, which can generate a property report with a summary of planning controls, detailed planning information and other matters affecting the property.

3. Match that against title, DP and restrictions

The 10.7 is essential, but it should sit beside title documents, easements, survey information and any 88B restrictions.

4. Decide the real approval strategy

Is this a CDC site, a DA site, or still unclear?

5. Brief the designer properly

Only after that should you lock a concept direction.

That sequence is how you avoid paying for drawings that belong on a different block.

One more reason the 10.7 matters

This is not just a website printout or a casual planning note.

The EP&A Act says that, in favour of a person who has obtained or reasonably relied on a planning certificate, the certificate is “conclusively presumed to be true and correct” for relevant offence proceedings. That is a strong reminder that the planning certificate is an official due-diligence document, not just admin paperwork.

Final word

If you are buying or designing in NSW, do not treat the Section 10.7 Planning Certificate as something you grab at the end.

Treat it as the first serious planning filter.

It will not replace a planner, certifier, designer, surveyor or specialist consultant. But it will tell you whether you are dealing with a clean site, a constrained site, or a site that needs a very different strategy than the one you had in mind.

That is exactly the sort of information you want before purchase, before concept design, and definitely before you commit to the wrong approval pathway.