Verify the Building Permission Before You Buy a Home in Hyderabad

On a Sunday viewing in Kondapur, a couple fell for an independent house, ground plus two floors, freshly painted, with a rent-paying tenant already on the first floor. The seller had photographs of the completed structure and a folder of receipts, and everything about the visit said this was a settled, income-earning asset. What the folder did not contain was the one document that decides whether those two upper floors are legal at all: the sanctioned building permission, and proof that what stands on the plot matches what the state approved. In Hyderabad, that gap between what is built and what is sanctioned is the single most expensive thing a buyer can fail to check.

The short answer. Before you pay any token money for a Hyderabad house or plot, confirm the sanctioned building permission on the state self-certification portal, BuildNow at buildnow.telangana.gov.in, which now carries forward the work of the earlier TG-bPASS system. Telangana grants approvals in tiers: plots up to 75 square yards for a ground or ground-plus-one house need no permission at all, plots up to 500 square meters and 10 meters of height run on online self-certification, and anything larger goes through a single-window scrutiny. The trade-off buyers underrate is that a self-certified approval is fast and light on paperwork, which means the burden of checking that the actual construction stayed within the sanctioned plan shifts almost entirely onto you.

What does a building permission in Hyderabad actually certify?

A building permission certifies that a specific plan, for a specific plot, with specific setbacks, height and floors, was approved under the Telangana building rules. It is not a statement that the finished building is safe or that the seller owns clear title; it is the narrow but vital confirmation that the structure was allowed to be built the way it was. When you buy a completed home, you are inheriting whatever was sanctioned, and just as importantly, whatever was not. If a third floor was added over a two-floor sanction, or setbacks were eaten into to widen rooms, the permission on record will not match the walls in front of you, and the deviation travels with the property to you as the new owner.

This is why the permission sits alongside title documents rather than replacing them. A registered sale deed and a clean encumbrance record tell you the ownership story; the building permission tells you the compliance story. Both have to be read before money changes hands, which is also why it pays to line up the encumbrance certificate check on the Telangana IGRS portal in the same week you pull the permission, so the two records can be compared against the same plot and survey number.

Which permission category does the home fall under?

The category depends on plot size and building height, and it decides how much scrutiny the approval received. Telangana uses a tiered structure, and knowing the tier tells you how much comfort the paperwork alone can give you.

Read the table as a warning as much as a map. The larger and taller the building, the more eyes the plan passed under before sanction, so a single-window approval carries real scrutiny. A self-certified instant approval carries far less, because the state took the applicant at their word. That is not a reason to distrust every self-certified home, but it is a reason to physically compare the sanctioned drawing against the built structure rather than assuming the certificate settles the matter.

How do you verify a permission on BuildNow before buying?

You verify it by pulling the sanctioned record yourself rather than trusting a photocopy from the seller. Telangana has moved its building and layout approvals onto BuildNow, the state portal at buildnow.telangana.gov.in that succeeds the TG-bPASS system many owners still refer to by name. The portal offers a citizen search where you enter the building permission number or the plot survey number and see the sanctioned plan status, the approved parameters and any recorded proceedings, without needing to log in. Ask the seller for the permission file or BP number, then look it up independently and match the sanctioned floors, height and setbacks against what you walked through.

If the number the seller gives you does not resolve on the portal, or the sanctioned plan shows fewer floors than the building has, treat that as a stop sign rather than a technicality. A permission that cannot be produced and verified is, for a buyer, the same as no permission. Keep a printout of what the portal shows on the day you check, because a sanctioned record you have seen with your own eyes is worth more than any assurance in a brochure.

What happens if the building deviates from the sanctioned plan?

An unauthorised deviation is not a paperwork nuisance; it is a liability that attaches to the property and therefore to you. Construction that goes beyond the permissible limits of the sanctioned plan, whether by adding floors, exceeding the approved height, or encroaching on required setbacks, is unauthorised under the Telangana municipal framework, and the enforcement machinery can act against it with penalties, prosecution, or in serious cases demolition. Because these consequences follow the structure, a buyer who ignores a visible deviation is buying the risk along with the walls.

The practical danger is rarely an immediate bulldozer. It is that a deviated building is harder to finance, harder to insure, harder to resell, and exposed if a complaint or a regularisation drive ever puts the plot under scrutiny. Lenders in particular compare the sanctioned plan against the construction before disbursing, so a deviation that you wave away can quietly shrink the pool of buyers and banks willing to touch the property after you. Verify the sanction, and where the built form clearly exceeds it, price that risk in or walk away.

Does a small plot really need no permission?

Yes, and that exemption is a trap if you misread it. For a plot up to 75 square yards built only to ground or ground plus one floor, the rules require no building permission and no occupancy certificate, so the absence of a permission document is entirely normal and lawful. The catch is that the exemption is tightly bounded. The moment a small-plot house rises to a second or third floor, or the plot is larger than the exemption allows, a permission was needed, and its absence is now a red flag rather than a feature.

So when a seller of a compact plot says there is no permission because none was required, verify two things independently: that the plot area truly sits within the exemption, and that the number of floors actually built stays within it too. An exempt house that quietly grew an extra floor has stepped outside the exemption without any paperwork to show for it, and that is precisely the kind of silent deviation a buyer inherits.

What should you check before you pay any token money?

Work through the permission the way a lender would, in order, before committing a rupee. This is the sequence that turns a nice viewing into a safe purchase.

1. Ask the seller for the building permission or file number and the sanctioned plan, in writing.
2. Look the number up yourself on BuildNow using the citizen search by permission number or plot survey number.
3. Match the sanctioned floors, height and setbacks against the structure you physically inspected.
4. Confirm which category applies, instant registration, instant approval or single window, so you know how much scrutiny the sanction carried.
5. For larger homes, check that an occupancy certificate was processed where the rules require one.
6. Cross-check the permission against the sale deed and the encumbrance record for the same plot and survey number.
7. Keep dated printouts of the portal record and raise every mismatch before you sign or transfer money.

None of these steps needs a lawyer to begin, though a title check by one is money well spent on a larger purchase. What they need is your refusal to accept a spoken assurance in place of a record you can pull yourself. If you are also weighing the tax side of the transaction, read our note on deducting one percent TDS and filing Form 26QB so the money leg is as clean as the compliance leg.

Frequently asked questions

Is TG-bPASS still the portal for building permissions in Hyderabad?

Telangana has moved its building and layout approvals onto BuildNow at buildnow.telangana.gov.in, the state self-certification portal that carries forward the work of the earlier TG-bPASS system. Owners and agents still say TG-bPASS out of habit, but for verifying a sanction today you should search the current state portal. Use the citizen search there to confirm any permission before you buy.

Can I check a building permission without logging in?

Yes, the state portal offers a citizen search that lets anyone look up a sanctioned plan by the building permission number or the plot survey number without creating an account. It returns the approval status and the sanctioned parameters recorded against that file. Always run this search yourself rather than relying on a copy supplied by the seller.

My plot is small and has no permission. Is that a problem?

Not necessarily. A plot up to 75 square yards built only to ground or ground plus one floor is exempt, so no permission or occupancy certificate was required. The problem appears only if the plot is larger than the exemption, or the house has more floors than it allows, because then a permission was needed.

What is the risk of buying a house that deviates from its sanctioned plan?

An unauthorised deviation attaches to the property, so as the new owner you inherit its exposure to penalties, prosecution or demolition action under the Telangana municipal framework. It also makes the home harder to finance, insure and resell. Verify the sanctioned plan against the actual construction, and treat any clear excess as a risk to price in or avoid.

Last updated 2026-09-02. PropNewz Team.