Rate of Inhabited Mobile Dwellings on Residential Properties in One Portland Neighborhood In June, 2020, I conducted some voluntary research to determine how many single family residential properties had an inhabited mobile dwelling. The Cully neighborhood consists of 12,595 residents, or 4,685 households. My survey found 65 inhabited mobile dwellings located on residentially zoned lots, which translates to a rate of 0.005/resident. Featured · Leave a comment

ADU Legislative Initiatives- History in the Making (Part IV) On August 12th, 2020, the City of Portland finally passed the Residential Infill Project. This was an overhaul of single family residential zoning regulations that was nearly five years in the making. This post will cover the changes that are coming with Residential Infill Project and also tease you with what is to come with Oregon’s House Bill 2001. August 17, 2020 · 2 Comments

Rent Control, PDX Ordinances and Recent Legislation Impacting ADUs. Over the past five years there have been new laws passed in Portland and Oregon targeting the residential rental market. This article will provide context on the passage of these laws, inform ADU owners how the laws affect their properties, and give guidance on how owners can best stay in compliance. February 28, 2020 · Leave a comment

Incremental Updates for ADUs for 2020 Here’s some notable stuff for those interested in ADU minutiae in the Portland market and beyond. It’s a mashup of information and updates that will be of interest to ADU advocates: ADU Permit Numbers, MLS, Mapping ADUs, SDCs, ADU events in April 2020, Summit videos, oh my. January 8, 2020 · 3 Comments

Carrie & Sterling Whitley’s ADU: Housing Stability for Two Generations Two generations of the Whitley family found a solution to both their housing dilemmas when Carrie and Sterling were approved as the first residents of Monterey Bay Habitat for Humanity’s My House My Home program. The big idea behind the innovative My House My Home program is to build ADUs to assist low income senior homeowners who might be vulnerable to housing instability because they are living on a fixed income. December 29, 2019 · Leave a comment

Evelyn Brom’s ADU: Another House for the Other Street In 1995, Evelyn Brown purchased her property in Seattle, WA and immediately imagined building a second house on it. The property was a through-lot, meaning that it spanned the distance between two streets. Her house, at one end of the property, fronted on one street and her garage, on the other end of the property, fronted the other street. Twenty years later the city caught up with Evelyn’s vision and she now lives in an ADU she has plenty of time to dream about. December 29, 2019 · 6 Comments

Diane Owen’s ADU: A Carriage House at My Daughter’s Place A few years ago, Diane Owen was sharing a house in Denver, CO with her daughter Mara, and Mara’s partner Andrew. Diane’s one bedroom, one bathroom multi-generational household also included three dogs, so it was a full house! Diane had been living with Mara and Andrew for three years and they got along really well, but there were moments that a little more wiggle room would be nice. December 22, 2019 · Leave a comment

Bertha’s ADU: A Tiny Cottage in My Son’s Backyard Bertha and her son John had always been fairly close, but they lived their separate lives in different parts of St Petersburg, Florida. Each of them owned their own home and neither had plans to sell, but all that changed in 2016 when Bertha received a surprise offer from someone who wanted to buy her house. December 15, 2019 · 1 Comment

Walt Drake’s ADU: A Father-in-Law Unit in My Own Backyard When Scott Drake bought his father Walt’s property in Decatur, GA they struck a deal. They’d build a carriage house for Walt so that he could remain on the property and have Scott and his wife and kids move into Walt’s old house. December 8, 2019 · Leave a comment

Consider Going All-Electric For Your ADU Natural Gas, or methane has been promoted both as a ‘Clean Fuel’ or a ‘Bridge Fuel’ in various circles, both locally and nationally during this time of climate crisis. Concurrently, the IPCC has called for a far more rapid decline in the use of fossil fuel, more rapid scaling up of renewable energy taking advantage of the falling costs, and avoiding a lock-in of high-carbon infrastructure. November 13, 2019 · Leave a comment

ADU Legislative Initiatives- History in the Making (Part II) As reviewed in my first post on this topical thread, significant and progressive legislative and regulatory ADU code overhauls are occuring at quickening pace in jurisdictions up and down the west coast. I’ve been tracking ADU regulatory reform fairly closely for a decade, and there hasn’t ever been a time period where ADUs have been gaining as much national traction as they are now. August 22, 2019 · 3 Comments

Recap of 2019 ADU Tour The ADU Tour in June was a blast. Approximately 800 people attended. We’ve made the 17 project profiles public. You can find them here. July 23, 2019 · 4 Comments

ADU Legislative Initiatives- History in the Making (Part I) The 24-hour period from the afternoon of Sunday, June 29th- afternoon Monday, June 30th, 2019, was an important day for ADUs. In the future, urban planners will point to that day as a signature moment for an era of deregulation and liberalization of codes for ADUs. July 8, 2019 · 13 Comments

ADU Development Costs Keep Going Up I’ve updated an extensive post about ADU development costs here. These updates are based new cost numbers that just came in from the upcoming 2019 ADU Tour in Portland, which serves as a repository of current and active primary source data for cost estimates. It turns out that current primary source data is critical when it comes to talking about the costs of ADUs, because the development cost numbers here keep escalating rapidly. May 28, 2019 · 10 Comments

2019 is the Year of ADU Financing Innovation Financing ADUs has remained a major challenge. But, in the future, 2019 will always be thought of as the year of ADU financing innovation. On April 29th, Portland State University convened a meeting in Washington, D.C to help flesh out some of the innovative programs that are being developed to finance ADUs. May 16, 2019 · 3 Comments

Seventeen ADUs! I don’t know what I was thinking.I couldn’t help myself. I kept saying yes; I couldn’t resist. Now, look what I’ve done.Maybe you’re wondering what am I talking about. I’m talking about this year’s ADU Tour, of course! April 29, 2019 · Leave a comment

Announcing Accessory Dwelling Academy and The ADU Tour On June 21st, 2019, we are running a new professional education event designed for builders, designers, lenders, realtors and appraisers who aspire to up their ADU game and stand out from the competition. February 11, 2019 · 2 Comments

ADU Permit Trends in Portland in 2017 and 2018 This post details some findings about ADU permit trends in Portland. First, we’ll start with the big picture. Here’s the latest data on the number of permits issued by the City of Portland for ADUs from 2000-2018. In 2017, 588 permits were issued. In 2018, 660 were issued. This is a total of 1248 ADU permits issued in 2017 and 2018. January 14, 2019 · 5 Comments

ADU Rental Income Can Be Used to Qualify Borrowers to Purchase on HomeReady Loans A HomeReady Mortgage is a Fannie Mae, first-time home buyer loan program, with minimum down payment requirements, and some very particular underwriting characteristics. When a borrower is purchasing a single-unit primary residence with a 3% minimum down payment and there is an ADU present, 75% of the potential rents from the ADU can be used to qualify. July 6, 2018 · 1 Comment

Asmund & Jenny’s ADU Asmund and Jenny had been considering building an ADU for quite a while and finally decided to take the plunge at the end of 2016. They were drawn by the potential for passive income, the need for more space for their growing family and guests, and they wanted to lock in the SDC fee waiver benefit before its scheduled expiration. They were particularly drawn to the short–term rental model to maintain the most flexibility. July 3, 2018 · 6 Comments

ADU Legislative Initiatives Abound SDC Waiver, Residential Infill Project, Oregon and California state legislative updates…. There are significant ADU legislative initiatives underway in California, Porltand, and Oregon at large. Each of these legislative efforts have national signficance. May 2, 2018 · 5 Comments

St. Paul’s first ADU goes up Over the course of a recent Saturday afternoon open house, more than 40 neighbors, friends and family stopped in to see a new apartment on Sherburne Avenue in the Hamline-Midway neighborhood and congratulate the owners, Eric and Chrissi Larsen, on its completion. This wasn’t just any apartment — it was the first accessory-dwelling unit to be built under St. Paul’s 2016 accessory-dwelling-unit ordinance. April 25, 2018 · Leave a comment

Accessory Dwelling Units: A Tale of Two Cities Guest post by Mark Thieroff from St. Paul, MN About five years ago, interest in accessory dwelling units had reached a critical mass in Minneapolis and St. Paul. ADUs were seen by proponents as a way to increase housing diversity and flexibility and add density in residential neighborhoods. But Minneapolis and St. Paul ended up taking very different approaches and, consequently, have seen markedly different results. April 3, 2018 · 1 Comment

Now Collecting ADU Stories from Across America Calling ADU Owners, Dwellers, Designers, and Builders from across America to share ADU stories for an exciting new project with AARP. The many benefits of ADUs – especially for multigenerational families – have caught the attention of AARP. They’ve commissioned a publication about ADUs, which will feature half a dozen case studies of ADUs with various configurations and uses. If you’re an ADU owner, dweller, designer, builder, or city planner and you believe you can help with this project, we’d love to hear from you! Just send me an email at accessorydwellings@gmail.com by February 28th, letting us know which of the four items above you’d like to assist with and send along a photo! February 16, 2018 · 1 Comment

Backdoor Revolution- Part V- Why Vancouver, BC has Done a Lot of ADU-Related Things Right Backdoor Revolution- The Definitive Guide to ADU Development is officially live! …Vancouver, British Columbia is the North American leader in ADU development. Among the most notable things that Vancouver has done is allowed both a secondary suite and a laneway home on the same property. Other US cities (Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington) are considering this idea now, but to my knowledge, no US cities allow it yet. January 23, 2018 · Leave a comment

Backdoor Revolution- Part III- Why Fostering ADUs is Different than Fostering other Housing Types One of the reasons that ADUs are especially challenging to foster is that they are generally developed by average homeowners. No other housing type is commonly developed by non-professional developers. If you don’t develop housing as a full-time profession, housing development is complicated and challenging. Actually, even if it IS a full-time profession, housing development is complicated and challenging. January 17, 2018 · 4 Comments

Backdoor Revolution- Part II- Informal ADUs One significant part of my book research was about informal ADUs. While permitted ADUs are still fairly rare, informal ADU (a.k.a. unpermitted ADUs) are not. In writing Backdoor Revolution, I discovered that informal ADUs have a lot to teach us. The book is now available for pre-order on Amazon. January 11, 2018 · 5 Comments

Backdoor Revolution – Part I – Origin In 2013, I was observing ADU trends in the US by tracking Google News Alerts and reading academic articles…. I’ve spent the last 2.5 years on this book, and I am proud to finally release it to the world on January 23rd, 2018. January 8, 2018 · 6 Comments

Building an ADU in L.A.- Part II (excerpt) Between 2003-2016, an average of one hundred permitted ADUs had been developed each year in L.A.. While 100 ADUs a year is something, it’s certainly not a lot of housing for a city with a population of nearly four million people, and 1.4 million housing units. But, 2017 has entirely changed the landscape for ADUs in California at large. And, L.A. has done something that no one expected. DRUM ROLL…… October 19, 2017 · 2 Comments

The First National ADU Summit on November 3-5 in Portland The Build Small Live Large Summit is the first ever national gathering of leaders in ADU policymaking, design and development. ADU industry practicioners across the country will convene to share and showcase emerging best practices regarding the development of this rare housing type. If you are an ADU enterprenuer, designer, builder, policy-maker, or advocate, we hope that you will be able to attend. September 26, 2017 · Leave a comment

2017 ADU Tour Wrap-Up The ADU Tour in Portland on September 9th and 10th was great. 600 people each day attended to see the 12 ADUs featured in NE Portland and the 12 ADUs in SE Portland. September 12, 2017 · Leave a comment

ADU Tour on September 8th-10th The ADU Tour is just a couple weeks away on September 8-10th. If you are planning to build an ADU, drop whatever else you have planned and clear your schedule for this weekend. This is the largest (and best) ADU Tour in the nation. August 24, 2017 · 1 Comment

ADU Tour- Early bird sales end August 19th Eary bird sales for the ADU Tour end on August 19th. You can buy tickets now. It’s shaping up to be an awesome event! There’s going to be 12 ADUs featured on Saturday in SE and 12 ADUs on Sunday in SE. For those who are only interested in seeing certain ADU structural types, here is the breakdown by day. August 3, 2017 · 1 Comment