S 1.0
How long it actually takes
Five kinds of project, drawn at real proportion, from the first drawing to the final sign-off. Nobody else in this trade publishes this, and it is the number you most need before deciding whether to start.
Reviewed October 2026 · planning ranges, not a promise
Time runs left to right. Each bar is a phase, at its real length relative to the rest of that project. Nothing has been shortened to look better.
The thing to look at first is not any individual bar. It is the point at which the green construction bar starts. On most San Francisco residential projects it is somewhere between half and two-thirds of the way along, which means that at the moment you first hear a hammer, most of your calendar is already spent.
The second thing to look at is the CP markers. A phase on the critical path moves the finish date if it slips. A phase without one has slack. On most of these schedules nearly everything is on the critical path, which is why a single delay anywhere is so expensive — and it is why the ADU schedule, where entitlement comes off the critical path, finishes six months earlier than an addition of similar size.
Each chart is drawn to its own length, with its own axis underneath. We have deliberately not drawn them all against one shared axis: doing that would make the shorter projects look like thin versions of the long ones rather than shorter ones, which is a different and misleading claim.
None of these schedules includes discretionary review, an appeal, a major redesign after Planning comment, or a delay caused by the owner. The first of those is the big one, and there is a chart for it further down this page.
The five phases
- Design Design & feasibility
- Measured drawings, structural concept, what the site will actually allow 8–20 weeks
- Entitlement Planning entitlement
- Planning review, neighbourhood notification, and discretionary review if it comes 12–52+ weeks
- Permit Plan check & permit
- Building, Fire and Public Works review, corrections, and issuance 12–36 weeks
- Construction Construction
- The part everybody talks about, and frequently not the longest one 16–52 weeks
- Closeout Inspection & closeout
- Final inspections, certificate of final completion, warranty and records 3–10 weeks
Phase durations on their own do not add up to a project total, because phases overlap. The charts below show the overlap.
S 2.0 Every project type
Five schedules, side by side
Each is a typical project of its kind, assuming no discretionary review and one round of plan-check corrections.
01 Additions & Vertical Expansion
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Design CP | 10 weeks | |
| Entitlement CP | 30 weeks | |
| Permit CP | 20 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 28 weeks | |
| Closeout | 6 weeks |
About 18 months end to end, of which roughly 11 are before demolition. Every phase except closeout is on the critical path, which is why an addition has so little slack in it: a delay almost anywhere moves the finish date. Add three to nine months if discretionary review is requested.
Additions & Vertical Expansion in detail — including what has to be established before anybody can price it.
02 Accessory Dwelling Units
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Design CP | 8 weeks | |
| Entitlement | 6 weeks | |
| Permit CP | 14 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 22 weeks | |
| Closeout | 4 weeks |
About 12 months end to end against roughly 18 for an addition of similar size. Note that entitlement is not on the critical path here — that single difference is most of the six months, and it is a consequence of state law rather than of anything a builder does.
Accessory Dwelling Units in detail — including what has to be established before anybody can price it.
03 Seismic & Structural
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Engineering CP | 10 weeks | |
| Entitlement | not required | |
| Permit CP | 10 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 18 weeks | |
| Closeout | 3 weeks |
About 9 months end to end, and the entitlement bar has disappeared entirely: structural work that does not change the exterior is not a Planning matter. This is the shortest and most predictable schedule on this site, which is worth knowing if you have a compliance deadline.
Seismic & Structural in detail — including what has to be established before anybody can price it.
04 Multifamily Renovation
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Design CP | 12 weeks | |
| Entitlement | 8 weeks | |
| Permit CP | 16 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 44 weeks | |
| Closeout | 5 weeks |
About 17 months, and unusually for this site the construction bar is the longest one. That is the occupancy: the work is staged unit by unit around people who are living there, and a staged sequence is a longer sequence. Entitlement is short because interior renovation rarely changes the exterior.
Multifamily Renovation in detail — including what has to be established before anybody can price it.
05 New Residential Construction
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Design CP | 24 weeks | |
| Entitlement CP | 52 weeks | |
| Permit CP | 28 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 48 weeks | |
| Closeout | 8 weeks |
Roughly 30 months, of which about 20 are before demolition or excavation begins. Every phase but closeout is on the critical path. If this chart looks discouraging, it is the most useful thing on the page: a new-construction budget built on an 18-month assumption is wrong by a year of carrying costs.
New Residential Construction in detail — including what has to be established before anybody can price it.
- Design
- Entitlement
- Permit
- Construction
- Closeout
- On the critical path
Prices are USD planning ranges for San Francisco residential work, exclude design and engineering fees, city permit and impact fees, geotechnical and hazardous-materials assessment, furnishings and any applicable tax, and assume normal access and no undisclosed conditions. Durations are planning ranges that assume no discretionary review and one round of plan-check corrections. They are published so an owner can plan before spending money on drawings. They are planning ranges, not a bid. Durations assume no discretionary review, one round of plan-check corrections, and an owner who makes decisions within the schedule. Reviewed October 2026. A price and a schedule for your project come from a written proposal against a defined scope. See the disclaimer.
S 3.0 The bad version
The same addition, with a neighbour who objects
This is what discretionary review does. It is the chart every owner should see before deciding what to propose, and the one no builder shows you.
Schedule DR Rear addition with discretionary review
| Phase | Duration | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Design CP | 10 weeks | |
| Entitlement CP | 30 weeks | |
| Review & hearing CP | 26 weeks | |
| Redesign CP | 8 weeks | |
| Permit CP | 20 weeks | |
| Construction CP | 28 weeks | |
| Closeout | 6 weeks |
About 27 months against 18 — nine months added, and a redesign in the middle of it. The review and hearing bar is drawn in the entitlement colour because that is what phase it belongs to; the redesign bar is in the design colour for the same reason. Colour on this site follows the phase, never the mood.
Not every project is exposed to this, and a project that is exposed does not always attract it. What we can do is tell you at the first meeting how exposed yours is, and design to reduce it. That conversation is free and it is worth more than anything else on this site.
| Cause | Typical effect | Whose it is |
|---|---|---|
| Discretionary review requested | +3 to 9 months | Nobody’s. Reduced by design, not by effort |
| A second round of plan-check corrections | +6 to 14 weeks | Usually the design team’s, and avoidable |
| Design change after permit issuance | +8 to 20 weeks | The owner’s, and the most common self-inflicted delay |
| Undisclosed condition found in the building | +2 to 12 weeks | Shared. Reduced by opening things up early |
| Owner decision taken slowly | +1 to 8 weeks each | The owner’s, and it accumulates quietly |
| Long-lead item not ordered in time | +4 to 16 weeks | Ours, and it is the one we are hardest on ourselves about |
| Appeal of a permit | +4 to 12 months | Nobody’s, and rare, and genuinely serious |
The third column is the useful one. Two of the seven are ours, two are yours, and three are nobody’s — and the ones that are nobody’s are the largest. A builder who tells you they can guarantee a date in this city is telling you they have not met the third column.
S 4.0 Questions
Questions about the schedule
The ones about money are on the prices page and in the payment policy.
Why does nobody else publish this?
Partly because it is uncomfortable, and partly because a builder who has not been through it many times genuinely does not know. The permit path is not something a contractor controls, so putting a number on it means taking responsibility for something that can be blamed on the city instead. We publish it because it is the question every owner is actually asking and because a realistic answer at the start is worth more than an optimistic one that falls apart in month four.
How accurate are these?
They are planning ranges for typical projects, which means they are useful for deciding whether to start and useless as a promise. The single biggest variable is discretionary review, and the chart below shows what it does. The second is you: an owner who takes six weeks to choose a kitchen has added six weeks, and that is genuinely common and genuinely nobody's fault.
Can the phases overlap?
Some of them, and squeezing that overlap is most of what schedule management on these projects actually is. Construction can start on early permits while later revisions are still in review. Long-lead items can be ordered during plan check. Structural engineering can run in parallel with Planning. What cannot be overlapped is the part where a decision is sitting on somebody else's desk, and that is the part that dominates.
What is the critical path?
The chain of phases where a delay moves the finish date. A phase that is not on it has slack: it can slip without costing you anything. On most of the schedules on this page nearly everything is on the critical path, which is exactly why these projects are so sensitive to a single delay. On the ADU schedule entitlement comes off the critical path, and that one difference is most of the six months it saves.
What can I do to make it faster?
Three things, in order of how much they help. Decide the design before permit submission rather than during construction, because a change after issuance means a revision and a revision means the queue again. Do the investigation early — open a wall, get the geotechnical report, find the sewer lateral — because a surprise in month eight costs ten times a surprise in week two. And design something that will not attract objection, which is where fifty years of reading the same permit counter is genuinely worth money.
What happens if the city takes longer than this?
It sometimes does, and it is not a change order. Time in review is an excusable delay: the schedule moves, the contract sum does not. What we do is tell you the moment we know, in writing, with what has happened and what the revised dates are — rather than letting you find out from a subcontractor. On a project of this length, the single thing owners most want and least often get is to not be surprised.
Which of these are you on?
Tell us the building and what you want to do to it and we will tell you which chart applies, how exposed you are to the one on the dark band, and what a realistic date looks like. That conversation costs nothing and it is the one with the most leverage on everything after it.
Trico Construction, LLC · 981 Howard St, San Francisco, CA 94103