Zoning

Those tiny groceries and cafes tucked into houses in San Francisco's residential neighborhoods are not leftovers from a looser era. The planning code allows small commercial uses in residential districts — on corner lots, only so far back from the corner, and only during set hours.

Los Angeles has five residential estate zones, and the number after the letters changes the rules. Two houses on the same street can face different side yards and a three-foot difference in height limit.

R1 is the one-family zone that covers most of residential Los Angeles. The rules that actually shape a remodel are the yard depths — and a wall-length rule most homeowners have never heard of.

C2 is the workhorse commercial zone of Los Angeles — the one behind most neighborhood shopping streets. It allows a long list of businesses without a hearing, and it quietly allows apartments too.

RM-2 is the moderate-density mixed residential district, and its front setback is not a fixed number — it is copied from your neighbours. Here is how that calculation works, what has to be planted in the result, and how RM-2 differs from the districts on either side of it.

San Francisco's smallest commercial zone is built around the three-shop corner cluster. It caps stores at one story, keeps the backyard intact at every floor, requires no parking at all — and quietly bans a long list of businesses.

Most San Francisco residential zoning answers "how many homes?" with a lot-area formula. The transit-oriented districts threw that formula out. What decides the number instead is the shape of the building you're allowed to draw.

Your parcel report says RH-1 and the listing calls it "prime single-family zoning." Here's what that actually allows: one house on a narrow lot, a 35-foot height ceiling that moves with the hill, setbacks copied from your neighbors — and more flexibility than the label suggests.

If you plan to add an outdoor fireplace or similar built-in feature within the required rear yard setback of a residential property in San Francisco, your design falls under the City’s “permitted obstruction” rules in Planning Code §136(c). (Single-Family Homes, R-3, Type VB)

Designing a new deck in San Francisco often runs straight into one big question: “How far can my deck project into the required setback or rear yard?”

Adding anything above the main roofline in San Francisco is one of the most highly regulated parts of residential design. For single-family homes, both the San Francisco Planning Code and the California Building Code (CBC) restrict what can be considered a “penthouse” and what can legally rise above the height limit. (R-3, Type VB)

For your R-3, four-story, Type VB project at 825 Francisco Street, the local limit of two cars per private residential garage comes from San Francisco Planning Code parking controls, not from the Building Code. The Building Code governs safety and construction, while the Planning Code governs how many vehicles you’re allowed to accommodate.

Got condensers or an ERV you’d rather not show? In San Francisco, R-3 houses (single/two-family, including 3–4 stories, Type VB) can absolutely hide rooftop equipment—**but the screen has to meet both Planning and Building Code rules.

For swimming pools in single- and two-family dwellings in California, the requirements are followed below.

For single- and two-family dwellings in California, elevators are not required by code, but where installed, there are specific compliance requirements.

To install a home office in a single- or two-family dwelling in California, you must comply with both statewide (California Residential Code) and local (such as San Francisco Planning Code) rules. The California Residential Code does not prohibit a home office, but any work must retain the residential character of the space.

The maximum Floor Area Ratio (FAR) for single-family (SF) development in San Francisco typically falls under the basic FAR limits set in Section 124 of the Planning Code. For most standard residential districts (RH-1, RH-2, RH-3), the basic FAR limit is 3.6:1.

The standard basic FAR limit for most residential districts is 3.6:1, unless the lot is closer to an RM-4 or RC-4 district, where the limit could be 4.8:1, or closer to a C-3 district, in which case the FAR may be 10:1.