I looked into building where I was (because land was surprisingly cheap compared to houses) and was told to allocate 2 years and $250k for permits. A significant chunk of that was paying an architect to respond to the city and resubmit the plans. This was back when most houses were under $1M, and the lots we were looking at were around $200k, so the permits were literally more valuable than the land, and a pretty large fraction of the value of the improvement.
I looked into building where I was (because land was surprisingly cheap compared to houses) and was told to allocate 2 years and $250k for permits. A significant chunk of that was paying an architect to respond to the city and resubmit the plans. This was back when most houses were under $1M, and the lots we were looking at were around $200k, so the permits were literally more valuable than the land, and a pretty large fraction of the value of the improvement.