Already have plans?

The permit-set checklist

Every Valley jurisdiction publishes its own residential submittal requirements, and they differ in the details. But a set that is genuinely ready to submit will have essentially all of this. Go through your drawings and check:

• Site plan: property lines, dimensioned setbacks, existing and proposed structures, lot coverage calculation, easements, driveway and drainage.
• Floor plans: dimensioned, with room names, door and window schedules and egress noted.
• Exterior elevations: all four sides, with heights, materials and finish grade.
• Foundation plan: footing sizes, slab details, post and hold-down locations.
• Structural / framing plans: sealed by an Arizona-registered engineer where the scope requires it. Beam sizes, headers, shear walls, connection details.
• Roof plan: pitch, framing direction, truss layout or a truss deferral note.
• Electrical plan: device and fixture layout, panel location, load calculation.
• Plumbing and mechanical: fixture locations, waste and vent, equipment sizing and duct layout.
• Wall sections and details: how the assembly actually goes together at the critical joints.
• Energy code compliance: the prescriptive or performance path documentation your jurisdiction requires.
• HOA approval: where applicable, most cities want it in the package.

If you bought plans online

Stock plan sets are genuinely useful for one thing: showing a builder the layout and the look you want. What they are not is buildable in Arizona out of the envelope.

What is typically missing or wrong:

• No Arizona structural engineering. Plans drawn for the Midwest are designed for snow loads and basements. Ours are designed for wind, seismic category, expansive soils and slab-on-grade. A city will not permit unsealed structural work.
• Wrong energy code path. Our climate zone drives insulation, glazing and duct requirements that a generic set will not address.
• No relationship to your lot. Setbacks, orientation, drainage, utility stubs and soils are all site-specific.
• Details drawn for other assemblies. Basement foundations, vented crawlspaces and framing details that do not match how we build here.

Budget for an Arizona designer and a registered engineer to convert the set. It is usually a fraction of a full custom design, and it is not optional.

What is usually missing, in order of how often we see it

1. Sealed structural drawings. Number one by a wide margin.
2. A real site plan with dimensioned setbacks. Concepts almost never have this.
3. Electrical load calculation. Especially on additions and ADUs, where the existing panel may not carry the new load.
4. Energy code documentation. Easy to add, easy to forget, and it will hold your permit.
5. A finish and fixture schedule. Not required for a permit, but without it no bid you receive is comparable to any other.
6. HOA architectural approval. Frequently the longest single item, and frequently started last.

How we review plans

Send us what you have, a PDF is fine, and we will look at four things.

1. Can it be permitted?

We compare your set against your jurisdiction's submittal checklist and tell you what is missing and roughly what it costs to fill.

2. Can it be built as drawn?

This is the constructability review, and it is where having a builder look at drawings earns its keep. Beams that cannot get into the space. A duct run with nowhere to go. A window that lands on a shear wall. A shower drain over a post-tension cable. None of these are the designer's fault exactly; they are just things you see from the field rather than from the desk.

3. What will it cost?

Once we know the scope is real, we price it line by line against our published ranges, so you can see where your project lands relative to what things cost here.

4. Is there a cheaper way to get the same thing?

Not a cheaper house. The same house, built smarter. Often that is a roofline simplification or a structural span that drops a beam size, and it is worth five figures for a day of thinking.

If the bids come back over budget

This is common enough that you should plan for it rather than be shocked by it. The productive response is value engineering, in roughly this order of return:

• Simplify the roof. Every plane, valley and dormer costs framing, sheathing, flashing and labor. Roof complexity is the most under-appreciated cost driver in residential construction.
• Reduce structural spans. A wall or post in the right place can take a $9,000 beam down to a $1,200 beam.
• Revisit the window and door package. Sizes, operation type and glazing spec swing a big number.
• Change the finish schedule, not the structure. Tile, counters, plumbing fixtures and lighting are the easiest things to adjust and the easiest things to upgrade later.
• Phase it. Build the shell and the systems properly now, finish the bonus room in two years. Never phase by lowering the quality of what is inside the walls.

What we would not do is shrink the square footage first. Reducing size cuts cost less than people expect, because the expensive parts (kitchen, baths, mechanical, foundation, roof) do not scale down proportionally.