Pergola, verandah or alfresco: does a roof need a permit?

Short answer: an open pergola is often exempt; put a solid roof on it and it is a verandah, which almost always needs a building permit once it is fixed to the house. Patio, alfresco, awning, gazebo or pergola — the name on the brochure doesn’t matter. The exemptions in Schedule 3 of the Building Regulations 2018 ask four things — roof, fixed to the house, size and position — and all of the conditions apply together.

This guide is about the roof question. If you already know the job needs a permit, our verandah and pergola permits page covers what we need and what it costs.

Open roof or solid roof

• A pergola is unroofed, or covered only with open-weave permeable material — shade cloth, slats with gaps, wire for a climbing plant.
• A verandah has a roof that keeps the rain off. Colorbond, tiles, polycarbonate, insulated panels, a retractable fabric awning and an opening louvre roof all count once they can close and shed water.

The pergola exemption’s key figures are a floor area of no more than 20 m², a height of no more than 3.6 m, and a position no more than 2.5 m forward of the front wall of the house. Inside those limits it can go ahead with no building permit.

Roofed, the question becomes attached or freestanding. Anything fixed to the house is an addition to the house, and there is no exemption for an attached roofed verandah, whatever its size. A freestanding gazebo can fall under the garden-shed exemption — no more than 10 m² of floor area, no more than 3 m high (2.4 m within 1 m of a boundary), behind the front wall and not masonry — but most verandahs are bigger than that.

Roofing an existing pergola

A pergola goes up exempt, and a summer later it gets polycarbonate sheeting. Sheeted, it is a verandah, and the pergola exemption does not cover the roof.

The surveyor assesses the structure as it now stands — size, setbacks, the fixing to the house, and whether posts and footings sized for an open frame can carry a roof in the wind. If the original pergola was bigger or further forward than the exemption allows, that comes up too. Have the roof assessed before the sheets go on.

Enclosing a verandah into an alfresco or outdoor room

An alfresco on a new home is usually a roofed verandah under the main roof, covered by the new-home permit. Enclose it later with fixed walls, doors and a ceiling and it is a room, and a room that adds floor area is an extension, not a verandah: the new part has to meet the NCC, including energy efficiency. Outdoor blinds and screens that open are not walls, but where that line falls is the surveyor’s call, so send us the plan first.

Kit verandahs

A kit verandah, carport or pergola is not exempt because it came in a box. The exemption looks at what gets built and where it sits, not who supplied it. Treat “no permit required” as a question, not an answer. The kit’s engineering is normally what we assess; the siting and the fixing to your house are what the brochure cannot know.

Decks and the 1 m rule

A deck attached to the house is permit work, whatever its size; a low freestanding deck is a case-by-case question our surveyor confirms from the drawings. The 1 m figure is a different rule: under the National Construction Code a fall of 1 m or more from the deck surface to the ground needs a barrier, and its height, gaps and climbability are then assessed. A low deck avoids the balustrade, not the permit.

Carports on boundaries

Most carports are too big for any exemption; position is the bigger issue. A carport can sit on or within 1 m of a side or rear boundary if it is open on the boundary side and inside the boundary-wall limits in the siting provisions: a length of 10 m plus a quarter of the remaining boundary (unless the planning scheme sets its own), an average height of 3.2 m and a maximum of 3.6 m. Past those, or into the front setback, it needs report and consent from council before a permit can issue.

Exempt from the permit, not from everything

An exempt pergola or gazebo sits outside the siting provisions; the exemption carries its own position and height conditions instead. Three things still apply: a planning permit can be needed whether or not a building permit is, in a heritage overlay for instance; building over a sewer, water or drainage easement needs the consent of the authority that owns it, permit or no permit; and an exempt pergola still has to resist wind and must not weaken the house it is fixed to.

What to send us

You do not need a permit to ask whether you need one. Send the supplier’s drawings, a site plan or marked-up aerial photo, and the address and we will tell you for free which side of the line you are on; if it needs a permit we quote a fixed fee, and our verandah, pergola, carport and deck permits page covers what is involved. Work that needed a permit and did not get one becomes a problem when the property is sold, so ask first.

Suppliers and installers: you can link your customers to this page, or send their drawings to us direct — see our page for builders and suppliers.