Plain-language statute summaries
Five statutes you should know about before signing anything. Each one moved a meaningful piece of the rulebook — and at least two of them quietly changed the financial calculus for owners.
Owners of multifamily parcels (duplex and up) can now build up to eight detached ADUs by-right, capped at the number of existing primary units. The bill also raised the statewide minimum ADU height from 16 to 18 feet for parcels near transit, giving room for a usable second story.
Affects: Owners of duplex, triplex, and larger multifamily parcels.Cities may now adopt an ordinance allowing ADUs to be sold as condominiums separately from the primary residence. Adoption is permissive — only a handful of California cities have opted in so far, but it's a meaningful exit-path option to track.
Affects: Single-family homeowners in cities that have opted in.Cities cannot require the owner to live on-site as a condition of permitting a new ADU. This makes the ADU a much more flexible long-term financial asset — you can move, keep the property, and rent both units.
Affects: Anyone building an ADU and weighing whether to keep the home long-term.Reduces barriers to permitting unpermitted ADUs built before January 2020. Cities can no longer require correction to current code for items that were code-compliant at the original build date, with limited health-and-safety exceptions.
Affects: Owners with informal ADUs, conversions, or backyard cottages.Detached ADUs up to 800 sqft, 16 feet tall, with 4-foot setbacks are approved ministerially — no discretionary review, no design review, no public hearing. Cities must act within 60 days of a complete application.
Affects: Anyone building a code-minimum detached ADU.Open a city dossier — state law plus your city's local interpretation, in one place.