Tell the tool what you are building out and it returns the drawing-set scope that implies: the sheets a Bay Area commercial plan check will expect to find, which licensed consultants get coordinated, an indicative sheet count and a planning-level drafting range.
Nothing here is a quote, a bid, an engineering determination or a boundary determination. We are a drafting and design firm: we coordinate with a licensed structural engineer and a Licensed Land Surveyor when your project needs one, rather than performing or stamping that work ourselves.
A commercial suite is reviewed under its own occupancy classification, against a different chapter of the code than a house, and against accessibility standards that reach further than anything residential work has to meet. That is why the sheet list a TI produces looks so different from a residential permit set: a reflected ceiling plan, a lighting and power plan, nonresidential energy forms and an accessibility sheet are baseline content rather than extras. Our commercial tenant improvement page covers how those sets get put together.
Use type is the first fork in the road. An office or flex build-out is mostly partitions, ceiling, lighting and power. A restaurant adds a commercial kitchen, exhaust, grease waste and a seating count that drives everything from fixture counts to exiting. A medical or dental suite adds plumbing density, equipment coordination and infection-control considerations that reach into the mechanical design. Those two paths carry the most drawn content per square foot, and the estimator prices them that way.
Square footage matters less than people expect, and it matters non-linearly. A larger floor plate repeats detailing it has already drawn once, while the code analysis, the accessibility sheet and the energy forms cost roughly the same whether the suite is two thousand square feet or twelve. The estimator tapers the rate as the space grows for exactly that reason.
If the classification of the space changes — retail becoming a restaurant with seating, a warehouse bay becoming office, a storefront becoming a clinic — the review stops being a comparison against the existing condition and becomes a comparison against what the new classification requires today. Exiting, occupant load, fire separation, ventilation and restroom fixture counts all get recalculated, and the code analysis on the cover sheet becomes the most scrutinized page in the set.
It also tends to pull accessibility into full scope. Alterations to an existing commercial building carry an obligation to bring the path of travel serving the altered area up to current standards, and California limits how far that obligation extends by measuring it against the value of the work, using a disproportionality test written into the code. The numbers behind that test move, and how a given department applies them is a conversation with that department — so the estimator flags the obligation rather than quoting a figure, and the actual scope gets confirmed against the current code and the jurisdiction before anything is committed.
If you are unsure whether your classification changes, say so. The estimator widens the top of the range instead of assuming the cheaper answer, which is the safer way to budget. The landlord’s existing permits and the previous tenant’s certificate of occupancy usually settle the question quickly.
We draft the architectural set and the plan-view mechanical, electrical and plumbing layouts. Anything requiring stamped calculations — structural framing for roof-mounted equipment or a new storefront opening, HVAC sizing, electrical service capacity, fire sprinkler hydraulics — is prepared and stamped by the licensed engineer of record, whom we coordinate with rather than substitute for. That division is not a technicality: it is what our engineering and specialist coordination page exists to explain. We are a drafting and design firm, not an engineering firm.
Nonresidential energy compliance is its own workstream. Envelope, lighting and mechanical compliance documentation has to be produced and printed into the set, and on a TI the lighting forms in particular tend to be what a reviewer checks first. See Title 24 and CF1R energy calculations page walks through how that documentation gets produced.
Restaurant work adds a second agency. Hood requirements and grease interceptor sizing are reviewed by the county health department alongside the building department, and those two reviews run on their own schedules. Planning for both from the start is the difference between a sequenced submittal and a surprise. Once the drawings are complete, our permit sets and expediting service carries the package through submittal and corrections.
No. Everything shown is drafting and documentation scope: the drawing set, the sheets in it and the coordination around it. Construction cost, landlord improvement allowances, permit and impact fees and consultant fees are all separate, and the consultant line is shown as coordinated rather than priced because those professionals bill you directly for their own stamped work.
Because it resets the comparison. Instead of reviewing what you are altering against the existing condition, the department reviews the space against everything the new classification requires now: occupant load and exiting, fire separation, ventilation, restroom fixture counts and accessibility. That usually means more sheets, more code analysis on the cover, and at least one more licensed discipline coordinated into the set.
An alteration to an existing commercial building triggers an obligation to bring the path of travel serving the altered area up to current standards, and California measures how far that obligation extends against the value of the work through a disproportionality test in the code. We do not publish a figure for that here, because the thresholds change and departments apply them differently. The scope gets checked against the code in force at submittal and confirmed with the jurisdiction, and some cities or landlords separately require a certified access specialist inspection, which is an inspection we point you toward rather than perform.
We draft the kitchen equipment plan, the hood location and the grease interceptor detail as part of the set, and we scope the drawings to support that review. Sizing the interceptor and confirming the hood requirement are decisions the county health department makes alongside the building department, on their own timeline, and we will not present that approval as something we control.
It depends on what you checked. Roof-mounted mechanical, a new storefront opening or a classification change normally means a licensed structural engineer. New HVAC, a service upgrade, restrooms or a commercial kitchen normally means a licensed MEP engineer. Sprinkler modifications and hood suppression normally mean a fire protection engineer or a licensed sprinkler contractor, usually as a deferred submittal after the main set is approved. The tool lists the ones your answers imply; we coordinate them, they stamp their own work.
No, and neither can anyone else before it is reviewed. What we can do is make the set complete and internally consistent, so the review turns on the design rather than on missing information. Submittal checklists, required sheets and local amendments differ across Bay Area jurisdictions, and the department you are filing with is the authority on all three.
Residential or commercial, drafting or Title 24 — send a few details and we'll follow up with next steps and a free quote.
(408) 676-8747
Sunny Drafting