Houston minimum lot size calculator

Answer five questions and this returns the governing figure from Sec. 42-181, with the section each part of the answer comes from — and what it cannot determine for you.

Before you use the lot size calculator

Have the property’s city-limit status, wastewater service and proposed access arrangement available. The answers describe your proposal; they do not verify the site.

Use the result as a list of questions for the city and your project team. It is not an approval or a buildable-home count.

Where is the property?

Wastewater collection service?

A courtyard style development?

Using a reduction route?

Do ALL lots take access from a shared driveway or permanent access easement?

3,500 square feet

Without one of the two reduction routes, the Sec. 42-181(a) baseline governs: 3,500 square feet within the city. Sec. 42-181(b) makes Sec. 42-182 and Sec. 42-184 the only two ways below it.

What this rests on

  • Sec. 42-181(a)(2) — The minimum lot size for a single-family residential lot within the city is 3,500 square feet. read it
  • Sec. 42-181(b) — A lot may go below the subsection (a) minimum only by meeting Sec. 42-182 or, within the city, Sec. 42-184. read it

What it cannot tell you

  • Whether the block carries a special minimum lot size designation. Sec. 42-181(e) makes such a requirement control over the other minimum lot size provisions of the section, so a designation overrides every figure below. The Planning and Development Department maintains a list of current designations.
  • Whether deed restrictions impose something stricter. They are private agreements, the holder can sue on one, and a city approval is no defence to that suit. Inside the city limits the city can act too: Sec. 10-552(a) makes failure to comply with a recorded restriction — after notice of Chapter 10 article XV — a civil violation of the Code carrying up to $1,000.00 per day, and Sec. 10-553 lets the city attorney sue and seek repair or demolition. Sec. 10-551 defines the restrictions this reaches to include one that fixes a setback distance or affects the size of a lot — that is, this very figure.

This is how the code reads; confirm with the city — or ask a builder who's actually pulled this permit in Houston. The authoritative text is the Houston Code of Ordinances; permitting questions go to Houston Permitting Center.