Does a DA add value. An honest answer, told through one street.

Two comparable waterfront properties sit side by side on the same street. One owner spent about two years, by his own account, and six figures obtaining a development approval, then sold with that approval in hand. The other sold through our work with no approval at all, and finished 14.7 per cent ahead once the approval route's cost and time are counted.

So does a DA add value. The honest answer is sometimes, and the difference is worth understanding before you spend anything chasing one.

The case for yes

An approval sells certainty. A buyer of an approved property skips the application costs, the waiting and the risk of a refusal, and buyers pay for that. Industry feasibility guidance puts shape on it: an equivalent property might trade noticeably lower without an approval than with one, and approval costs for small to mid-scale projects commonly run from the tens of thousands into six figures once holding costs during the wait are counted. Those figures come from industry publishers, not a rule, but they show the shape of the arithmetic. And the approval as the selling point is visible in public listings: in February 2026 a Military Road property in Mosman was marketed as shovel ready, with its development approval for six luxury apartments the centrepiece of the campaign (Mosman Collective, 26 February 2026).

The case for no

An approval is a snapshot of the rules on the day it was granted, and the rules have been moving quickly. In Gordon, a council-approved 2018 DA for seven storeys and 55 apartments is being superseded by a proposal for 28 storeys and 180 apartments on the same block, using transport oriented development bonuses, more than three times the apartments the old approval allowed. A developer pricing that property today is pricing the current planning envelope, not the old paperwork. Sometimes an older approval is a base to build on rather than dead weight: also in Gordon, an approved 32-apartment scheme was amended up to 53 apartments using the low and mid-rise housing bonus. And the approval route can go backwards: one Sydney property with development complications, in that case basement construction requirements, resold in 2024 for less than its 2020 purchase price.

Two properties, one street

Back to those two waterfront properties, because we were in the middle of one of them and the mechanics matter. Our client signed a contract in October, within about three weeks of listing. Our advice after signing was uncomfortable: take the property off market and relist once the competing stock cleared, because four competing listings of a similar and unusual type were on the market at the same time. The client relisted in January, and after two weeks of negotiation the property exchanged in March, at a stronger result than the October contract.

The neighbouring owner took the approval path instead: roughly two years and six figures, by his own account, then a sale with the approval in hand.

Put them side by side. The unapproved property exchanged at the stronger price, and its owner never carried the six-figure cost the approval route required next door. Net of that cost and those two years, our client finished 14.7 per cent ahead. It is not a verdict against approvals either. A buyer who had offered on our property went on to buy the neighbour's after we withdrew, not drawn by the approval but already committed to the street and planning to build their own home there. The approval route simply was not the most money for that owner, on that street, at that time.

The 14.7 per cent figure is net of the comparable's approval costs and elapsed time, not a price against price comparison. Every result is specific to its property and its moment.

So which is your property

The answer turns on three things no article can settle for you. What the current zoning already permits, because a generous envelope can make an approval redundant and a tight one can make it decisive. Who the likely buyer is, because a family or a luxury buyer pays nothing for an approval they will never use, while some developers and builders pay well for certainty. And whether your circumstances can absorb the process, because the costs and the months are real whichever way the application goes.