Carpenter in Lisarow

If your land is rural-zoned, the setback rule is completely different

This is the one that catches people, and it's worth reading twice.

Under NSW exempt development rules, a deck, patio, pergola or verandah in a standard residential zone needs a setback of at least 900mm from every boundary.

In the rural and large-lot zones — RU1, RU2, RU3, RU4, RU6 and R5 — that setback is 5 metres. Not 900mm. Five metres, from every lot boundary.

If your Lisarow property carries one of those zonings, a structure that would be perfectly exempt on a suburban block three streets away may not be exempt on yours. On a large block that's usually easy to accommodate. On a smaller rural-zoned lot with the house sitting close to a boundary, it can rule out the exempt pathway entirely.

Check your zoning on the NSW Planning Portal Spatial Viewer before you plan anything. It's the first thing we look at on a Lisarow quote.

The other exempt development limits still apply

The zoning changes the setback. It doesn't remove the rest:

• Maximum 25m² floor area
• Floor no more than 1 metre above existing ground level
• No more than 3 metres at the highest point
• Behind the building line of any road frontage
• Enclosing walls no higher than 1.4 metres
• Total floor area of all similar structures under 15% of the home's ground floor area (lots over 300m²)

Bushfire prone land

Semi-rural Lisarow and the bushland fringes toward Mount Elliot and Ourimbah carry bushfire prone land mapping. The mapping includes buffer zones around vegetation categories, so a property doesn't need to back onto bush to be included.

Where it applies, exempt development requires anything within 5 metres of the dwelling to be non-combustible, and larger projects get assigned a BAL rating that determines permitted materials.

Old rural buildings deserve a proper look

The outbuildings left over from the orchard era vary enormously. Some are beautifully built in hardwood that's still sound seventy years on. Others were thrown up quickly for a specific purpose and have been quietly failing ever since.

Two things worth knowing before you spend money on one. First, the timber in the good ones is often better than anything you can buy today and absolutely worth restoring. Second, converting an outbuilding to habitable use is a different regulatory question to repairing it — habitable space brings in ceiling height, ventilation, light, damp-proofing and fire requirements, and it needs approval.

We'll tell you which category yours falls into before you commit.

Access and services

Acreage work has practical differences that affect a quote honestly given: getting materials to a build site 200 metres from the road, ground conditions after rain, and structures sited well away from the house needing their own consideration for services and drainage.