5.2 Auxiliary Dwelling Units - Mark Jurchen

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Allowing and Restricting Uses Communities get to decide whether to let ADUs be used just like any other housing type or to create special rules for them.Some municipalities prefer the simple approach:regulating ADUs like other homes.So if a home-based child-care service is allowed to operate in the primary dwelling,it is also allowed in an ADU. Conversely,communities sometimes adopt ADU-specific regulations in order to avoid undesirable impacts on neighbors.Examples of those regulations include: Limiting short-term rentals ADU flexibly."For instance,an Owner-occupancy rules are usually ADU can be rented nightly to implemented through a deed ADUs tend to work well as short- tourists,then someday rented to a restriction and/or by requiring that term rentals.They're small and the long-term tenant,then used to an annual statement confirming owner usually lives on-site, making house an aging parent.ADUs residency be filed. Some cities go it convenient to serve as host. intended primarily for visting further,saying ADUs can be occupied However, if ADUs primarily serve family are sometimes used as only by family members,child-or as short-term rentals, such as for short-term rentals between visits. adult-care providers,or other Airbnb and similar services, it undermines the objective of Cities concerned about short-term employees in service of the family. adding small homes to the local rentals can regulate them across Owner-occupancy requirements housing supply and creating all housing types. Doing so might make the financing of ADUs more housing that's affordable. mean that special rules are not difficult,just as they would if needed.An approach employed in applied to single-family homes. In popular markets,short-term Portland,Oregon, is to treat ADUs But as ADUs have become more rentals can be more profitable the same as other residences long-term ones,allowingcommon,owner-occupancy than except that any financial incentives restrictions have become less so, homeowners to recoup their ADU (such as fee waivers) to create which is good. Such requirements expenses more quickly. In addition, them are available only if the limit the appraised value of short-term rentals can provide property owner agrees not to use properties with ADUs and reduce owners with enough income that the ADU as a short-term rental for options for lenders should they they can afford to occasionally use at least 10 years. need to foreclose. the ADU for friends and family. Requiring owner occupancy Enforcing owner-occupancy laws A survey of ADU owners in three Pacific Northwest cities with Some jurisdictions require the can be tricky,and the rules have mature ADU and short-term rental property owner to live on-site, been challenged in courts, markets found that 60 percent of either in the primary house or its sometimes successfully. However, ADUs are used for long-term ADU.This is a common way of according to a study by the Oregon housing as compared with 12 addressing concerns that absentee Department of Environmental percent for short-term rentals. landlords and their tenants will Quality, more than two-thirds of allow homes and ADUs to fall into properties with ADUs are owner- Respondents shared that they disrepair and negatively impact the occupied even without an owner- "greatly value the ability to use an neighborhood. occupancy mandate. ■ a / 4 The zoning code of Brevard,North Carolina,a city r.. •� �-� of fewer than 10,000 residents,allows ADUs,which q, I �`� e_ tea.., are referred to as"secondary dwelling units"and are _ allowed allowed"within residentially-zoned,single-family ' ` it code and duplex lots."The code states that such homes ' I "shall be encouraged and designed to meet housing 11064 �' '` needs,"adding that"[s]econdary dwelling units shall 1 " ' be accessory and subordinate to the primary living _- 1 . quarters."In the image at left,the one-story cottage .T quarters." the primary dwelling.The apartment above the detached garage is the secondary dwelling. The ABCs of ADUs I AARP 17