Every link here is an official Irish planning resource. We've added a one-line note on what each is good for, and where our advice adds a practitioner's read on top.
What can be done without permission, and how to check.
Our interactive checker for extensions, garages, porches, attics, walls and solar, with the current size and height limits.
Open the checker →The Office of the Planning Regulator's plain-English leaflet on exempted development for homes.
Clear summary of extension, garage, porch, wall and solar rules, kept up to date.
Read →The different permission types (outline, full) for a new home, and how to apply.
Read →Notices, forms and the online route.
What to include, the notices, drawings and documents. The homeowner leaflet.
Open PDF →How the system works end to end, a solid overview for first-timers.
Open PDF →Lodge and view applications online across local authorities.
Our plain-English timeline, notices, the 8-week decision and the appeal window.
Read the guide →Making a submission or appeal correctly.
How to make a submission to the local authority, and what counts as a planning ground.
Read →The national appeals body's own guidance on how to appeal, and the forms.
Open →The current fee for each type of appeal, check before lodging.
Fees Finder →Our explainers on how to appeal and what a planning authority can consider.
All guides →The framework decisions are actually made against.
Every council's website, and its Development Plan, the document an application is judged against.
National planning policy, guidelines, consultations and the National Planning Framework.
Open →Independent oversight of the planning system, with public guidance and research.
Open →The Acts and Regulations themselves, the primary source when the detail matters.
Search →The evidence base.
Our own monthly, evidence-based read on housing delivery, built from the official CSO and BCMS open data.
Open the data →The full Citizens Information planning section, a reliable first stop for any question.
Read →These guides and tools are published as a public service and are kept to the primary legislation. They are not a free advice line, and individual queries are not answered by email or phone. For a general question about a particular property, the planning authority's planning department and Citizens Information are the starting points, and a declaration under section 5 is the formal answer. Where a matter needs professional work, the practice takes instructions on a fee basis: from developers, landowners, investors and public bodies, and from private clients, for example on retention or regularisation of unauthorised development or a change of use, and occasionally a one-off house, subject to capacity.