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Palisades Plans

Guidance, not a permit

Starting a Pacific Palisades rebuild

You do not have to decide today. This is the sequence most homeowners move through after the Palisades Fire. City rules control the outcome, and this site does not issue permits or promise a timeline.

Start with the property you still have

The house may be gone. The lot is not. Look up the address to see public lot size, zoning, and the earlier building area, plus a preliminary planning estimate. Those records can be wrong. They are a place to start, not a survey and not a determination of what you may rebuild.

The lookup is limited to burned homes with no building application on file. If a permit is already in process, this public list will not show that address. Owner names and phone numbers are not on the page.

Separate the decisions

People often bundle four different decisions into one anxious question. They are separate:

  • Whether the lot is clear enough to measure, which is a debris and access question.
  • Whether an insurance claim is settled, which this website does not handle.
  • What can be drawn and permitted, which is a design and City question.
  • Whether to build it, which is a later construction contract.

You can price a survey and a set of drawings before you have chosen cabinets, and before you have agreed to build.

A practical order

  1. Read the City’s current rebuilding page. As of September 27, 2026, that overview is at recovery.lacity.gov/rebuilding.
  2. Confirm the lot with a survey, and the ground with a soil report if the foundation depends on it.
  3. Decide the size you actually want, using the preliminary living area only as a ceiling to test, not as the design.
  4. Prepare architectural, structural, and fire-sprinkler drawings for the path the City says applies to your zone.
  5. Submit for review, answer comments, and only then talk about a construction contract.

Pacific Palisades includes both flatter R1V areas and hillside R1H areas. The same street can have different rules from one lot to the next. Do not assume a neighbor’s approval is yours.

What this site will not tell you

It will not tell you that a permit is guaranteed, how many weeks plan check will take, or that a like-for-like rebuild is available on your lot. Those answers come from the City of Los Angeles, and they change. It will also not tell you what your insurer owes. If you want help with the planning set, start with the services and the address.

About the fire · The building process · Planning services · Open your address