Owning land with development potential does not automatically mean development is the right decision. Before spending money on consultants — or accepting the first offer a developer puts in front of you — every Western Australian landowner should be able to answer five questions.
We meet landowners at every stage of this journey: some with a subdividable backyard in an established Perth suburb, some with a large coastal holding, some with a site the family has held for decades. The questions that matter are the same in every case, and the order matters too. Here they are, in the order a disciplined feasibility works through them.
1. What can legally be built here?
Everything starts with the planning framework. In Western Australia that means your zoning and your density coding (the R-Codes), your local government’s planning scheme and policies, and any structure plans or special control areas that apply to your land. Together these shape the realistic development envelope: how many dwellings, of what type, at what height, with what setbacks and open space.
Two warnings from experience. First, the theoretical maximum is not the practical maximum — site dimensions, orientation, existing trees, easements, sewer location and vehicle access frequently reduce what the coding suggests on paper. Second, planning frameworks change; a site coded one way today may sit inside a precinct earmarked for something different. Understanding not just the current controls but their direction is part of reading a site properly.
Servicing belongs in this question too: where power, water and sewer are, what capacity exists, and what it costs to connect. A site that needs a sewer extension or headworks upgrades can carry six figures of cost that no zoning map reveals.
2. Who is the likely buyer of the finished homes?
Development is manufacturing a product for a customer, and the customer should shape the product. A project designed for downsizers — single-level living, lock-and-leave security, low-maintenance gardens, storage for a caravan or boat — looks nothing like one aimed at young families, investors or premium owner-occupiers.
The buyer question disciplines every later decision: the number of dwellings, the size and mix, the level of specification, even whether to sell off the plan or complete. Suburbs have real demand profiles — what has actually sold, at what price, to whom — and a feasibility that ignores them is a spreadsheet, not a plan. The most common mistake we see is designing for an imagined buyer the suburb doesn’t contain.
3. What is the complete cost — not just the construction cost?
Landowners usually have a fair sense of build costs per square metre. What sinks feasibilities is everything around the build: planning and design consultants, surveys and engineering, approvals and application fees, demolition, site works and servicing, Western Power and Water Corporation charges, finance establishment and interest, holding costs (rates, land tax, insurance) for the full program, marketing and selling costs, settlement costs, GST treatment — and a genuine contingency, because something always moves.
A complete feasibility lines all of this against realistic end values with sensible timing assumptions. If the margin only works when every line item lands perfectly, the project doesn’t work. The margin has to survive contact with reality — and a project that can’t afford its contingency can’t afford to start.
4. What delivery structure suits you?
There is more than one way to realise the value in your land, and the right structure depends on your appetite for risk, your need for certainty and your timeline:
Sell the land outright — clean, certain, immediate, but you capture only land value, not development profit. Develop it yourself — you keep the upside and carry every risk: funding, approvals, construction, market timing. Enter a joint venture — you contribute the land, a developer contributes capability and delivery, and returns are shared under an agreed structure. Appoint a development manager — you remain the owner and principal; an experienced team runs feasibility, design, approvals, delivery and sales for a fee.
Each structure allocates risk and reward differently, and the honest answer differs from site to site and family to family. We’ve set out how these structures work in more detail on our Landowners page.
5. What produces the best risk-adjusted result?
The final question ties the others together — and it is where inexperience is most expensive. The maximum number of dwellings is not always the most profitable outcome, and it is almost never the most marketable one. Eight compromised homes can be worth less, sell slower and carry more risk than six generous ones; the two extra lots can cost more in construction, time and price erosion than they return.
Risk-adjusted thinking asks: which scheme has the strongest margin per unit of risk? Which product does this suburb demonstrably absorb? What happens to each option if the market softens 5% or the program runs six months long? The best development is the one that stays a good decision under pressure.
Answer the questions before you commit
A disciplined early feasibility — done before contracts, before consultants multiply, before positions harden — can prevent expensive redesign and reveal opportunities a basic planning assessment misses. It can also tell you honestly that development is not the right move for your land yet; that answer, delivered early, is worth a great deal.
If you own land in Perth or regional WA and want a clear-eyed view of what it could support, start a confidential conversation. A preliminary assessment costs nothing, and you’ll get the reasoning, not just a number.