 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(March 2020) |
Nonconforming use in urban planning the use of land that was authorised at the time the use was created but is no longer allowed due to changes made to the zoning restrictions after that time. [1] Secondary suites are commonly permitted as a non-conforming use in the zoning district they are located in because the suite was developed prior to the zoning ordinance coming into effect.
The landowner may explicitly intend to discontinue the use by agreeing to end the use.
Implied intent exists if the landowner fails to exercise the nonconforming use. If the landowner discontinues the nonconforming use after a specified period, commonly 21 years in many jurisdictions[ where? ] but shorter in many others, then the nonconforming use will be terminated and parcel will become subject to the zoning requirements of the area in which it is located. Such a discontinuance of the use implies the intent to abandon the use.
In some jurisdictions, if the structure exercising the nonconforming use is destroyed beyond a certain percentage (usually 50%) it cannot be rebuilt or repaired. Instead, the parcel becomes subject to the applicable zoning regulations thereby ending the nonconforming use's reprieve from the zoning regulations. In others, by statute usually allowed to rebuild within a limited period. If dwelling, usually permitted to rebuild.
Local governments may, and often do, prohibit the replacement of older non-conforming mobile homes with newer non-conforming mobile homes because the replacement tends to perpetuate and extend the time the non-conforming use continues. See e.g. Lincoln County North Carolina. Code §10.2.3; Linn County, Iowa Code Art. 3, sec.1 para.6; Davenport Florida City Code §5.01.04.
Some states allow amortization of the nonconforming use whereby the nonconforming use's immediate value is amortized over the course of a set period and once the value of the nonconforming reaches zero the nonconforming use ends. Normally such an ordinance is upheld unless it is arbitrary or discriminatory or unreasonable, and it is usually limited to certain uses and outside of those uses it may be an unreasonable exercise of police power. A reasonable exercise of an amortization end of the nonconforming use allows for a complete return on the investment.
Many property-rights advocacy groups are critical of amortization, because it forces property owners to cease a previously lawful use without providing them with any compensation. [2] In some states, amortization of a nonconforming use is unconstitutional.
Zoning is a method of urban planning in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into areas called zones, each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for a single use, they may combine several compatible activities by use, or in the case of form-based zoning, the differing regulations may govern the density, size and shape of allowed buildings whatever their use. The planning rules for each zone determine whether planning permission for a given development may be granted. Zoning may specify a variety of outright and conditional uses of land. It may indicate the size and dimensions of lots that land may be subdivided into, or the form and scale of buildings. These guidelines are set in order to guide urban growth and development.
In United States constitutional law, a regulatory taking occurs when governmental regulations limit the use of private property to such a degree that the landowner is effectively deprived of all economically reasonable use or value of their property. Under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution governments are required to pay just compensation for such takings. The amendment is incorporated to the states via the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Growth management, in the United States, is a set of techniques used by the government to ensure that as the population grows that there are services available to meet their demands. Growth management goes beyond traditional land use planning, zoning and subdivision controls in both the characteristics of development influenced and the scope of government powers used. These are not necessarily only government services. Other demands such as the protection of natural spaces, sufficient and affordable housing, delivery of utilities, preservation of buildings and places of historical value, and sufficient places for the conduct of business are also considered.
This aims to be a complete list of the articles on real estate.
A variance is a deviation from the set of rules a municipality applies to land use and land development, typically a zoning ordinance, building code or municipal code. The manner in which variances are employed can differ greatly depending on the municipality. A variance may also be known as a standards variance, referring to the development standards contained in code. A variance is often granted by a Board or Committee of adjustment.
Adverse possession, sometimes colloquially described as "squatter's rights", is a legal principle in the Anglo-American common law under which a person who does not have legal title to a piece of property—usually land —may acquire legal ownership based on continuous possession or occupation of the property without the permission (licence) of its legal owner.
In the United States, a plat (plan) is a cadastral map, drawn to scale, showing the divisions of a piece of land. United States General Land Office surveyors drafted township plats of Public Lands Surveys to show the distance and bearing between section corners, sometimes including topographic or vegetation information. City, town or village plats show subdivisions broken into blocks with streets and alleys. Further refinement often splits blocks into individual lots, usually for the purpose of selling the described lots; this has become known as subdivision.
A garage apartment is an apartment built within the walls of, or on top of, the garage of a house. The garage may be attached or a separate building from the main house, but will have a separate entrance and may or may not have a communicating door to the main house. A garage apartment is one type of "accessory dwelling unit" or ADU, a term used by architects, urban planners and in zoning ordinances to identify apartments smaller than the main dwelling on one lot or parcel of land. Other examples of ADU's include granny flats, English basements, mother-in-law suites, and auxiliary units.
In land use, a setback is the minimum distance which a building or other structure must be set back from a street or road, a river or other stream, a shore or flood plain, or any other place which is deemed to need protection. Depending on the jurisdiction, other things like fences, landscaping, septic tanks, and various potential hazards or nuisances might be regulated and prohibited by setback lines. Setbacks along state, provincial, or federal highways may also be set in the laws of the state or province, or the federal government. Local governments create setbacks through ordinances, zoning restrictions, and Building Codes, usually for reasons of public policy such as safety, privacy, and environmental protection. Neighborhood developers may create setback lines to ensure uniform appearance in the neighborhood and prevent houses from crowding adjacent structures or streets. In some cases, building ahead of a setback line may be permitted through special approval.
The administrative divisions of Virginia are the areas into which the Commonwealth of Virginia, a U.S. state, is divided for political and administrative purposes. Some are local governments; others are not. However, all local governments are political subdivisions of the state.
Secondary suites are self-contained apartments, cottages, or small residential units, that are located on a property that has a separate main, single-family home, duplex, or other residential unit. In some cases, the ADU or in-law is attached to the principal dwelling or is an entirely separate unit, located above a garage or in the backyard on the same property. In British English the term annex or granny annex is used instead. Reasons for wanting to add a secondary suite to a property may be to receive additional income, provide social and personal support to a family member, or obtain greater security.
A special-use permit authorizes land uses that are allowed and encouraged by the ordinance and declared harmonious with the applicable zoning district.
Spot zoning is the application of zoning to a specific parcel or parcels of land within a larger zoned area when the rezoning is usually at odds with a city's master plan and current zoning restrictions. Spot zoning may be ruled invalid as an "arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable treatment" of a limited parcel of land by a local zoning ordinance. While zoning regulates the land use in whole districts, spot zoning makes unjustified exceptions for a parcel or parcels within a district.
In the United States, zoning includes various land use laws falling under the police power rights of state governments and local governments to exercise authority over privately owned real property. Zoning laws in major cities originated with the Los Angeles zoning ordinances of 1904 and the New York City 1916 Zoning Resolution. Early zoning regulations were in some cases motivated by racism and classism, particularly with regard to those mandating single-family housing. Zoning ordinances did not allow African-Americans moving into or using residences that were occupied by majority whites due to the fact that their presence would decrease the value of home. The constitutionality of zoning ordinances was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in Village of Euclid, Ohio v. Ambler Realty Co. in 1926.
In the United States, highway beautification is the subject of the Highway Beautification Act (HBA), passed in the Senate on September 16, 1965 and in the U.S. House of Representatives on October 8, 1965, and signed by the President Lyndon B. Johnson on October 22, 1965. This created "23 USC 131" or Section 131 of Title 23, United States Code (1965), commonly referred to as "Title I of the Highway Beautification Act of 1965, as Amended", and nicknamed "Lady Bird's Bill." It was the pet project of the First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson, who believed that beauty, and generally clean streets, would make the U.S. a better place to live.
An easement is a nonpossessory right to use and/or enter onto the real property of another without possessing it. It is "best typified in the right of way which one landowner, A, may enjoy over the land of another, B". An easement is a property right and type of incorporeal property in itself at common law in most jurisdictions.
A severance can in law mean the act of severing a piece of land from a larger tract of land. The severed parcel of land becomes a separate lot (parcel). Second, it can refer to, in jurisdictions that have the form of co-ownership, the ending of a joint tenancy by act or event other than death. Third, it can be defined in a definitions clause or table in ways including the removal of a party from an agreement, or a permitted ending of the agreement — in an employment contract/negotiations especially common as to severance pay and other terms of severance — or part of the agreement in which case it may be either capable of forming the heart of a new agreement, that is being superseded or instead varied to be non-binding (avoided) as to future conduct and the parties should ensure which meaning is meant in this third range of senses.
Goldblatt v. Hempstead, 369 U.S. 590 (1962), was a United States Supreme Court case concerning whether a town ordinance regulating a use of a property was unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment, finding the law in question was constitutional as an exercise of the town's police powers.
Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion, and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building permit.
