For homeowners
Adding a home to your property
A movable tiny home, an ADU, a manufactured or modular unit: the path is the same, and it runs through two gates. First, whether it's allowed where your property sits. Then, whether the unit itself meets code.
Gate 1
Is it allowed here?
This is the gate that stops most movable tiny homes, modular, and manufactured housing before they start. It is entirely local, and the first job is finding out which local government you answer to.
1. Find out who regulates your property.
In California, your land is governed by either a city or a county, and which one decides everything about what you can build. If your property sits inside a city's limits, the city's rules apply. If it's in an unincorporated area, the county's rules apply instead. These are different governments with different rules, and a mailing address alone won't tell you which you're under, since a city and the county around it often share the same name.
How to tell which one applies to you:
- Look up your parcel with your county assessor. The record shows your jurisdiction.
- Check whether your address falls inside a city's limits or in unincorporated county land.
- When in doubt, your city or county planning counter can confirm which government regulates your parcel.
A searchable jurisdiction and resource lookup is in development. Until then, the steps above are the reliable path.
2. Then go to that government's own rules.
Once you know whether it's your city or your county, go to that government's own planning and land use pages. They're the authority, and they keep their rules current. Look for three things: what their zoning allows on your parcel, how their permitting works, and whether they've adopted any updates that make tiny homes, ADUs, or other alternative housing easier to build.
That last part is where communities differ most. Some have modernized their rules; many haven't yet. Knowing where your jurisdiction stands is the difference between a project that's straightforward and one that isn't possible yet.
3. Not allowed where you are yet?
If your jurisdiction hasn't updated its rules, you're not out of options, you're just early. Other California communities have already adopted language that allows this housing, and those ordinances are public record. Understanding what exists, and what other places have done, is where a conversation with us can help.
Talk it through with us.
On a short call, we can help you understand what your jurisdiction allows today and point you to the public ordinance language other communities have adopted. What you do with that is up to you, and many homeowners use it to start an informed conversation with their own local officials.
Request a call →Gate 2
Will it pass?
Once you know it's allowed, this is whether the unit itself meets standards, and here we can speak plainly, because the rules are statewide.
- 1
What kind of unit you're dealing with
A movable tiny home (on wheels), a tiny home on a foundation, a manufactured home, a park model, and an RV are all different things under California law, with different standards and different agencies. Knowing which you have decides everything downstream.
- 2
The certification crosswalk
ANSI, NFPA, the Health & Safety Code, HCD, and the DMV each govern part of this, and almost nobody has laid them side by side. We have. This is where the building-code path gets concrete.
- 3
Permits and inspections
What you file, in what order, and what an inspector is actually looking for, in plain language, so the process isn't a black box.
- 4
How it can be financed
A legal, permitted, code-compliant unit opens up financing options, which bring safeguards like appraisals and inspections. However you choose to pay, knowing what those safeguards are helps you protect yourself.
- 5
Before you sign anything
Verify a contractor's license and bond, read the contract, and know the payment-schedule norms before any money changes hands.
Not sure what your unit needs?
The certification path depends on exactly what you're building or buying, and it's an easy place to go wrong. On a call, we can help you sort out which standards and agencies apply to your specific situation.
Request a call →