Home / How Much a Minor Variance Costs
Short answer: the planning work starts at $5,000. The municipal fee, the survey and the drawings sit on top of that, and the total depends on which of them your file actually needs. Here is what sits behind the number.
Last updated August 2026. By Matthew Kruger, MCIP, RPP.
Most people budgeting for a minor variance look up the municipal application fee, write it down, and stop. That fee is real, but on a typical Toronto file it is a minority of what the application actually costs you. The rest is the material the Committee needs in order to decide, and almost none of it is optional.
The honest way to budget is in four buckets: the municipal fee, the technical material, the planning work, and the cost of getting it wrong. The last one is the largest and the one nobody prices, because a refusal does not just cost you the fee again. It costs you the season.
Toronto sets its Committee of Adjustment fees in a published schedule and adjusts them every year, normally effective 1 January. Any figure you find quoted online is a snapshot of whichever year it was written, and quoting a stale number is the most common budgeting error in this process. Check the City's current fee page before you file. What is worth understanding is the structure, because that stays the same even when the numbers move.
Additions and alterations to an existing dwelling containing three units or less. This is the lowest tier and the ordinary homeowner file: a rear addition, a third storey, a deck that misses a setback.
A residential dwelling containing three units or less. The distinction from the tier above is whether you are altering an existing building or dealing with the dwelling itself. It is worth getting right before you budget, because the gap between the two tiers is substantial.
All other residential, commercial, industrial or institutional uses. The highest tier, and the one that applies to anything beyond a small residential file.
Double the applicable fee where the variance is sought after the fact, meaning the work is already built. This is the single most expensive mistake in the process and it is entirely avoidable. If you are buying a property with unpermitted work, or you have started construction and discovered a zoning problem, the doubling applies.
Fees outside Toronto vary widely. Smaller municipalities are often substantially cheaper, and two-tier municipalities can layer a regional fee on top. The structure is broadly the same everywhere; only the number changes.
The Committee cannot decide an application it cannot read. These are the items that make a submission complete, and the ranges below reflect what these typically cost in the Toronto market. Your file may not need all of them.
A survey. Usually the second largest line after the planning work. If you have a recent one you may not need a new one, and if the last survey predates the current building you will.
Architectural drawings. Cost varies with complexity. You need drawings anyway for the building permit, so this is rarely a cost the variance creates. It is a cost the variance brings forward.
An arborist report, where protected trees are on or near the work. In Toronto this is not discretionary: minor variance and consent applications must include tree-related material, including a tree declaration and a site plan showing protected trees and their protection zones.
Engineering, where grading, drainage or structural questions arise. Often not required at all on a simple file.
A planning rationale or planning justification. This is the document that argues your application against the four tests. It is where the file is won or lost, and it is the one item on this list that is about persuasion rather than measurement.
Almost every page on the internet explaining what a minor variance costs is written by someone selling construction or real estate. They will tell you what the survey costs and what the drawings cost, and then the line for the planner will be vague or missing. So here is ours, in the open.
Permit.Land's fixed planning fee for a minor variance starts at $5,000, agreed in writing before any work begins and not adjusted afterwards. That covers reviewing the zoning and confirming exactly which variances are required, preparing the planning rationale, assembling and filing the application, responding to staff comments through circulation, and attending the hearing.
What it does not cover: the municipal fee, the survey, the drawings, and any technical reports. Those are third-party costs paid to third parties, and we will tell you which ones your file actually needs before you commission any of them.
Worth knowing: a Toronto realtor who documented her own Committee of Adjustment file publicly itemised the whole ledger, and the planner was one of the larger single lines alongside the survey, the drawings and the City fee. She holds a graduate degree in planning herself and still concluded that hiring a planner to steer the process was essential.
Add it up and the planning fee is usually the largest single item, with the survey and drawings next and the City fee smaller than most people expect. A simple file with an existing survey and no tree issues comes in well under a contested one with opposition and an appeal.
This is the part of the fee schedule almost nobody publishes, and it matters if you are deciding whether to proceed at all.
Toronto's refund policy runs on three stages. Withdraw before the application is circulated internally and 80 percent of the application fee may be refunded. Withdraw after internal circulation but before the Notice of Hearing has been mailed and 50 percent may be refunded. Once the Notice of Hearing has been mailed, there is no refund.
The practical consequence is that the cheapest moment to discover your application will not succeed is before it is filed, and the second cheapest is in the first few weeks. That is an argument for getting an honest read on the four tests up front rather than filing and hoping. It is also why we would rather tell you a file will not fly before you spend anything on it.
Three things turn a predictable file into an expensive one, and only one of them is about money at the outset.
Doing it after the fact. The fee doubles, staff scrutiny increases, and you have lost the argument that the proposal is hypothetical and adjustable. If work has already been done, say so early and plan for it.
Organised opposition. A neighbour with a letter is normal. A residents' association with a planner is a different file, and it usually means a deferral, a revised proposal, or an appeal. Each of those adds months and cost.
A refusal you appeal. An appeal to the Toronto Local Appeal Body or the Ontario Land Tribunal adds a filing fee, expert evidence, and often counsel, and it runs on tribunal timelines rather than yours. It is sometimes the right answer. It is more often cheaper to revise and reapply, and an honest assessment should tell you which you have before anyone files anything.
See the full pricing schedule or the Minor Variance page.
Related guides: How long a minor variance takes · Minor variance vs rezoning · The four tests explained · Planning glossary
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