FAQ.

We help Australian homeowners and small developers prepare DA submissions without hiring a A$3-10k town planner. You upload your reports (survey, architectural plans, BASIX, geotech, BAL — whatever you have). We extract every claim, cross-reference against every applicable LEP/DCP/SEPP and NCC clause, and draft the council-ready documents — Statement of Environmental Effects, RFI responses, Clause 4.6 variations, neighbour notification letters, the lot. Subscribers also get our 24 DIY checklists and weekly Planning Pulse newsletter.

Our drafts are designed to be lodgement-grade after your review. Every claim is cited back to the source document and the applicable rule (instrument + clause + version). We don't guarantee approval (no-one can — that's Council's call) but we ship the same documents a town planner would produce, at a fraction of the cost. For complex projects (RFB, heritage, appeals) we still recommend engaging a registered town planner — we'll even refer you via /planning/consultants.

All 8 — see /planning/states. NSW currently has the deepest live-data integration (we query NSW Spatial Services for real-time zoning + overlays). VIC and ACT live integration is in progress. Other states get state-level context plus our static catalogue of instruments.

A Snapshot is the free 30-second lookup — zone, overlays, pathway (CDC/DA/SSD). A Property Report is the paid A$99 deep version — every applicable rule listed, BAL/flood/contamination triggers, AS 2870 site class, NCC classification, and the planning narrative your council expects.

Three packs: Lite A$299 (granny flat, CDC, minor works), Standard A$499 (typical new dwelling, dual occ, major reno), Complete A$799 (multi-dwelling, RFB, variations, heritage). Town planners charge A$3,000-10,000 for the same scope. Subscribers save another 20-35%. See /planning/packs.

Subscriptions buy you the daily-driver tools (checklists, unlimited Snapshots, change-watch on saved addresses, draw entries, discounts) — not the per-project drafting work. Most members don't lodge a DA every month, so we don't charge as though they did. When you do need a Pack, your subscription unlocks the discount.

Yes — every à la carte item works without a subscription. Property Report A$99, SEE Draft A$249, RFI Response A$129, Clause 4.6 A$299, Heritage Impact A$349, Neighbour Letters A$49, Pre-DA Brief A$129, Conditions Decoder A$79. See /planning/tasks.

Time-saving. The compliance engine does in 30 minutes what your junior planner does in 4 hours. Plus you keep the billable time. Practice tier (A$249/mo) includes unlimited DA Packs + branded outputs (your firm's letterhead) + multi-LGA monitoring + AI-usage audit logs (Federal Court GPN-AI / NSW SC GEN 23 ready for indemnity). Firm tier adds SSO, API, white-label. See /planning/pro.

It's a NSW Liquor & Gaming Trade-Promotion Lottery — entries are a benefit of paid subscription (not sold). Member: 2 entries/mo. Plus: 5. Premier: 15. VIP: 40. Plus bonus entries when you buy a per-task item. See /planning/draw for the full mechanics.

No. It's a Trade-Promotion Lottery — entries are free (granted as a benefit of subscription or engagement) and we publish the RNG seed before the draw closes for verifiability. Trade-Promotion Lotteries are regulated by NSW Liquor & Gaming.

The free-entry route is required by NSW Trade-Promotion Lottery rules. Postal-entry instructions are at /postal-entry. We never disadvantage free-entry route entrants vs paid subscribers.

Yes — for any property prize, stamp duty and conveyancing costs are covered by HOC. You receive the property with title transferred + no mortgage attached.

Each draw uses a published RNG seed committed publicly before the draw closes. The seed + entry list produces a deterministic, verifiable winner selection. We publish the audit trail with every draw.

We use Anthropic's Claude — currently the best model for technical/legal long-context work. But more importantly: we constrain the AI to cited drafting. Every claim in our outputs is mapped back to a source document (with page reference) and an applicable rule (with instrument + clause + version + URL). That's the audit trail that makes the output defensible.

We de-identify personal information (names, addresses, signatures) before sending to Claude where reasonably practicable, then re-identify on the way back. Our AWS storage is pinned to ap-southeast-2 (Sydney). Cross-border disclosure is explicit in our Privacy Policy.

There's no requirement to disclose AI-assistance in a residential DA. For court / tribunal submissions (L&E Court, VCAT, etc.) disclosure rules apply (Federal Court GPN-AI, NSW SC GEN 23) — our Firm tier exports include disclosure-ready text.

No. We're a software service. Our outputs are AI-assisted drafts intended for your review before lodgement. For matters needing a registered professional (Class 2/3/9C in NSW under DBPA, RPEQ-signed engineering in QLD, or formal advocacy at tribunal), engage the appropriate practitioner.

Standard turnaround is under 24 hours for Lite + Standard packs once you've uploaded all your reports. Complete pack with variation requests may take 48 hours. Priority queue available for Pro Solo+ subscribers.

Yes — from /me/account. Subscriptions stop at the end of the current billing period. One-shot purchases are refundable within 14 days if you haven't downloaded the output.

Snapshots work for all of AU — we use Google Places for address resolution. Live ArcGIS zoning data is currently NSW only with other states rolling out. The pack drafters work for any AU address — we apply state-level + national rules even where live overlay data is still in development.

Australia. Home Owners Club Pty Ltd is an Australian company. Our infrastructure runs on AWS Sydney.