A Georgia House committee on Wednesday approved a measure that would allow tiny homes to be built in most single-family properties’ backyards — a welcome surprise for housing advocates who say boosting residential density is key to making housing more affordable.
House Bill 1166 would override local zoning restrictions, so that homeowners could build 400-square-foot or smaller homes, also known as accessory dwelling units (ADUs), on their lots. It now heads from the House Governmental Affairs Committee to the House Rules Committee, and then, potentially, a floor vote. The bill has until Crossover Day on March 6 to make it out of the House and into the Senate.
Authored by Rep. Tangie Herring (D-Macon), HB 1166 seemed stuck in committee earlier in the week, bogged down by Republican concerns over large corporate homebuyers adding ADUs to their single-family properties to inflate home values.
But the House Governmental Affairs Committee on Feb. 25 voted unanimously to advance a substitute version, which added language to prevent institutional investors from adding ADUs to the houses they own, and to clarify that the ADUs must comply with local and state laws regarding utility connections. (Critics had initially worried that widespread ADU construction could overwhelm water and sewage systems.)
“This is part of the solution to some of the housing issues that families are facing,” Herring told Atlanta Civic Circle after the vote. “This is for a family who has a single-family home and wants to build a home for an aging parent, a child who’s returning home from school and can’t afford rent, or a caregiver that stays with them.”
Local housing advocates said the bill could expand housing access and affordability in municipalities with zoning codes that prohibit or complicate ADU construction.
“If this bill passes, it would give homeowners more flexibility to decide if ADUs are for them and allow them to age in place, if that’s what is best for them,” said Ernest Brown, who chairs Abundant Housing Atlanta.
Eric Kronberg, the CEO of tiny-home builder Kronberg Urbanists + Architects, said a state-level bill to facilitate ADUs is critical because of regional zoning differences.
“When cities try to come up with their own city-level solutions, there’s no guarantee that their regional partners will follow suit — so it often becomes a game of NIMBY,” he said of “not it my backyard” opposition to greater residential density.
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