In California right now, there is a significant amount of interest in “accessory dwelling units” (ADUs). These used to be called “granny flats”, “in-law units”, or “back yard cottages”. Now they are most commonly called “accessory dwelling units” or “secondary dwelling units”. By definition, an ADU is a smaller dwelling […]
Secondary Dwelling Unit
26 posts
Every project has it’s own pace. Some are quick. Some are slow. Some hit road blocks. Some are paused and come back. One of my projects, which had been put on “hold” back in December, has come back to life. The project is in Sunnyvale. It was a project that […]
The project to legalize an in-law unit in San Francisco is complete! (Or at least, near enough to complete.) This project was to take an existing “unpermitted” in-law unit in a house in San Francisco, and, within the City’s legalization program, make the changes required to legalize the unit. The […]
San Francisco has a program, the purpose of which is to encourage landlords to improve the earthquake safety of their properties. If a landlord voluntarily performs a seismic upgrade to a building meeting certain specific criteria, the City allows the landlord to add one or more rental units to the […]
Oh, heavenly day! We got the permit! Pardon me while I dance a little jig in celebration. You see, this is a small San Francisco project legalizing an existing secondary dwelling. We are doing this through a special program San Francisco offers, which allows owners of houses with unpermitted second […]
Every project has it’s own challenges. Sometimes it is the siting. Sometimes it is the budget. Sometimes it is a tricky space planning problem. This project, currently in the office, is to add a new Secondary Dwelling Unit to a single family house in Danville. The challenge on this project […]