Hi Danielle,
You could use the construction loan calculator on the Financial Parameters input page to represent lease and development costs. The calculator uses "Months prior to operation" but does not limit the number of months, so, for example, you could use 7 years * 12 months/year = 84 months for a pre-installation cost that is spread over 7 years.
Alternatively, you could calculate these costs outside of SAM and assign them to one of the capital cost categories on the Installation Costs page.
SAM applies the "total construction financing cost" from the Financial Parameters page to Year 0 of the cash flow (you can see that value on the Cash Flow tab of the Results page under "Investing Activities), so the two approaches are equivalent.
Best regards,
Paul.