ADU's - Affordable Housing

The future of affordable housing in inventory limited cities will be ADU’s (accessory dwelling unit). First let’s define an ADU: an accessory dwelling unit is known as a mother in law suite, carriage house, granny flat, among many other less common names. ADU’s are secondary living space or apartment that occupies a portion of the primary zone lot in addition to the primary house, typically built above a two or three car garage.

Denver has a massive inventory problem, and will need ADU’s to augment the city’s housing issues. One of the major factors within most of the Denver city limits pertains to the lack of available land, there is not much accessible land to easily add more homes via a large building development. Homeowners need to be able to maximize the land they own or have the opportunity to increase their land value via loosened zoning laws. Obvious economics state: low inventory = high demand. Rising home prices, lack of available land, and low inventory means something practical needs to be done. Unless wages continue to rise at the percentage of home prices percentage increases, homeowners will need supplemental income via renters in their ADU to keep up with Denver’s real estate appreciation.

ADU Zoning has loosened over the last year and will continue do so since the city of Denver realizes this affordability issue isn’t going away. The simple solution is to allow ADU’s in all Denver neighborhoods, otherwise we will fall in line with many other unaffordable cities on the coast. Cheers to a bright future!

Sincerely,

Mayor Mike