Consents
How long building consent takes, at every council
The national median is 9 working days of council processing and 16 working days total once your own responses to council questions are counted (January to March 2026). The legal maximum is 20 working days of processing time. Every consent authority is below, from MBIE's quarterly monitoring.
Total elapsed days is the number that matters to your project: it runs from lodgement to decision, including the time the clock is stopped while you answer requests for information (RFIs). Sorted fastest first.
| Consent authority | Total elapsed (median days) | Council processing | Applicant RFI time | Met 20-day timeframe |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kawerau | 5 | 3 | 17 | 100% |
| BCAL | 0 | 5 | 0 | 100% |
| Ruapehu | 6 | 5 | 4 | 98.1% |
| Waitomo | 7 | 5 | 8 | 100% |
| Wellington City | 7 | 4 | 1 | 96.3% |
| Kaikōura | 8 | 5 | 12 | 100% |
| Manawatu | 8 | 4 | 6 | 98.4% |
| Consentium | 9 | 1 | 25 | 100% |
| Kāpiti Coast | 9 | 6 | 7 | 98.4% |
| Carterton | 10 | 2 | 5 | 94.3% |
| Clutha | 10 | 7 | 3 | 97.9% |
| Far North | 10 | 7 | 8 | 99% |
| Invercargill City | 10 | 6 | 10 | 98.2% |
| Tararua | 10 | 8 | 13 | 98.6% |
| Tasman | 10 | 6 | 2 | 98.8% |
| Waimate | 10 | 10 | 1 | 76.3% |
| Buller | 11 | 6 | 3 | 95.9% |
| Dunedin City | 11 | 10 | 13 | 98% |
| Marlborough | 11 | 7 | 9 | 93.2% |
| Rangitikei | 11 | 8 | 4 | 96.3% |
| Rotorua Lakes | 11 | 7 | 9 | 100% |
| Selwyn | 11 | 7 | 3 | 98.4% |
| Whanganui | 11 | 6 | 6 | 100% |
| Gisborne | 12 | 3 | 10 | 98.3% |
| Waipa | 12 | 6 | 2 | 98.4% |
| Waitaki | 12 | 9 | 11 | 100% |
| Whakatāne | 12 | 5 | 8 | 100% |
| Christchurch City | 13 | 6 | 11 | 99.5% |
| Gore | 13 | 7 | 7 | 100% |
| Grey | 13 | 9 | 3 | 98.7% |
| Nelson City | 13 | 7 | 8 | 99.3% |
| Taupō | 13 | 9 | 6 | 100% |
| Waikato | 13 | 9 | 8 | 97.6% |
| New Plymouth | 14 | 9 | 12 | 98.5% |
| Waimakariri | 14 | 9 | 5 | 97.5% |
| Westland | 14 | 8 | 9 | 100% |
| Whangārei | 14 | 8 | 6 | 97.9% |
| Napier City | 15 | 3 | 9 | 100% |
| Palmerston North City | 15 | 6 | 5 | 97.3% |
| Hutt City | 16 | 11 | 6 | 97.8% |
| Kaipara | 16 | 9 | 8 | 100% |
| Timaru | 16 | 3 | 4 | 95.3% |
| Central Hawke's Bay | 17 | 14 | 4 | 81.5% |
| Central Otago | 17 | 11 | 6 | 88.3% |
| Masterton | 17 | 14 | 10 | 98.1% |
| Porirua City | 17 | 13 | 8 | 98.6% |
| Southland | 17 | 10 | 9 | 96.3% |
| Stratford | 17 | 9 | 7 | 98.3% |
| Thames-Coromandel | 17 | 9 | 10 | 96.4% |
| Hurunui | 18 | 13 | 12 | 96.2% |
| Mackenzie | 18 | 6 | 12 | 87.3% |
| Matamata-Piako | 18 | 12 | 5 | 97.3% |
| Queenstown Lakes | 18 | 7 | 6 | 90.3% |
| Western Bay of Plenty | 18 | 15 | 6 | 98.5% |
| Ashburton | 19 | 13 | 10 | 89% |
| Hamilton City | 19 | 12 | 10 | 98.1% |
| South Waikato | 19 | 13 | 4 | 98.9% |
| Upper Hutt City | 19 | 15 | 9 | 90.9% |
| Hauraki | 20 | 14 | 7 | 97.3% |
| Horowhenua | 20 | 16 | 10 | 96.2% |
| Tauranga City | 20 | 10 | 11 | 91.3% |
| Wairoa | 20 | 12 | 14 | 100% |
| South Wairarapa | 21 | 9 | 17 | 96.1% |
| Ōtorohanga | 21 | 8 | 13 | 83.3% |
| Hastings | 22 | 7 | 51 | 98.7% |
| South Taranaki | 22 | 11 | 15 | 97.2% |
| Ōpōtiki | 22 | 8 | 15 | 77.8% |
| Auckland | 28 | 15 | 19 | 86.2% |
Source: MBIE Building Consent System Performance Monitoring, Q1 2026 (MBIE). Medians are for building consent applications; regional authorities are excluded by MBIE due to low application numbers. Consentium and BCAL are private consent authorities. MBIE calculates each column's median separately, on different sets of applications, so the columns do not add up and can look inconsistent for small authorities.
How to keep your consent fast
The gap between a council's processing days and the total elapsed days is mostly RFI time, and MBIE's analysis attributes about 66% of RFIs to missing documents, 10% to incorrect documents and 5% to misalignment between architects and engineers. Lodging a complete, internally consistent application is worth more than picking a fast council. What consents cost is on our consent fee comparison, and each council's full picture (times, fees, what slows it down) is on its own building consent page.
Can you start building before the consent is granted?
No. Carrying out restricted building work without a consent is an offence under the Building Act 2004, and unconsented work follows the property into every future LIM and sale, where it costs far more to resolve than the waiting would have. The exception is work listed in Schedule 1 of the Act: certain low-risk work, such as some small detached buildings and low decks, is exempt from needing a consent at all. Your council's own guidance, linked from its building consent page, is the place to confirm which side of that line your project sits on.
How long a consent stays valid
Getting the consent is not the end of the clock-watching. A building consent lapses if the work has not commenced within 12 months of it being granted, unless the council agrees to extend it. And once the work is finished there is a second deadline: if no code compliance certificate has been applied for within 2 years of the grant, the council must decide whether to issue one anyway. An open consent with no CCC is one of the most common problems that surfaces in a LIM years later, long after the builder has moved on.
If the council goes past 20 working days
The 20 working days is a statutory duty, not a guarantee, and the clock legally stops while an RFI sits with you. That is how a consent can be inside the law and still take months of elapsed time. The honest measure of a council is the share of consents it decides inside the statutory timeframe, which MBIE publishes and the table above shows per authority. If your application is stuck, the first question to ask the council is whether the clock is running or stopped, because the answer decides whose move it is.
Building or renovating? Check the property's title, zoning and hazard layers first.
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