Developing a property takes work. Paperwork.

If you stumbled upon this blog looking for a magic bullet to get past all the paperwork involved with property development or real estate investing, you are in luck, you came to the right place.  I would be happy to do your paperwork for you for one small payment of $1 Billion.  Unfortunately, I am non-negotiable on the price.

All joking aside, there will be a lot of paperwork.  You NEED to expect this from the start.  There literally are no short-cuts.  What has worked for me is just keep your head down and do one item at a time and pass it along.  That is literally the best I could do.  Yes, the bank, or city, or county, or engineer, etc., will make you redo documents.  They will need more information.  It's part of the gig.  Don't let it get you down.  If you feel like you are overwhelmed, do one item at a time.  Typically, that one item isn't insurmountable. 

Here are a few documents you can expect to fill out for a property development (in no particular order):

Zoning application (if rezoning)
Site plan submittal
Variance application
State plan review authorization form
DNR delegation of authority form
DNR stormwater management maintenance agreement
Bank loan apps
SBA loan apps
Personal financial statement
Sworn Construction Statement
Insurance paperwork
Life insurance paperwork
Lien Releases
Construction contracts
Updates to your tenants
Pro-forma to Bank
Pro-forma to SBA
Draw funding requests
Draw funding log
Draw funding request signature page
Various other SBA forms
Tenant leases
Attorney contracts
Bank account docs
Checking account docs
Corporate Docs
Past tax returns (2-3 years)
Interim balance sheets for your other properties/companies
Rent rolls for your current properties
Future rent rolls for your current properties
Projected rent rolls for the new property
Meter requests
Meter agreements

I'm sure I'm missing a few.  Yes, that's a lot of paperwork.  But the most you typically see at any given time is 5-6 of these items.  If you take one item at a time, it's totally doable.  Don't worry, the pain is over pretty quickly.  Just know that this is the part that separates the haves from the have-nots.  This is one of your biggest hurdles if not THE biggest hurdle.