Cleveland County, NC Accessory Structures: ADU Rules (2026)

Sec. 12-138(b), inside the Unified Development Ordinance's accessory-buildings section, is the specific standard for a habitable accessory structure such as a garage apartment or granny suite in the zoned areas of unincorporated Cleveland County: it must stand no closer than 30 feet to the principal building on the same lot, in addition to satisfying the ordinary side-yard setback that applies to whatever residential district the lot sits in, for example five feet in the R, RM and RR districts or ten feet in the RA district under Sec. 12-174. The 30-foot separation is measured building to building, not lot line to lot line, and applies on top of, not instead of, the district's side-yard requirement.

The subsection's opening phrase, 'as may be permitted by this chapter,' ties habitable accessory use back to whatever the applicable zoning district otherwise allows; where a district's table of permitted uses or another article of chapter 12 does not authorize a habitable accessory structure, Sec. 12-138(b)'s distance rule does not independently create that right. The county also allows, under Sec. 12-138(c), a double garage split across two adjoining residential lots with both owners' written consent filed with the building permit application, and cross-references the accessory-building setback table in Sec. 12-174 for the remaining dimensional limits. Any habitable accessory structure built closer than 30 feet to the principal dwelling, or that fails its district's side-yard setback, is a chapter 12 violation.