Monterey, CA Building Safety: Anti-Mansionization (2026)

Monterey City Code § 38-23(D)(3) sets the Maximum Floor Area Ratio for the R-1 Residential Single-Family District at 40%, subject to footnote (g), which excludes up to 250 square feet of a garage not occupied by any appliance, equipment, mechanical system, work bench or built-in fixture, along with carports, decks, uncovered patios and landscaping areas from the FAR calculation. 40, with the garage exclusion reduced to a 300 square-foot one-car allowance on the smaller lots and 500 square feet on the larger ones. Substandard lots also carry a maximum height of 25 feet and an aesthetic design mandate requiring architectural features such as decks, bay windows, chimneys, stairways, recesses or projections to avoid a 'box like' appearance and long, unmodulated facades.

New construction, alterations and additions must go to the Community Development Department for review by the Development Review Committee, and Planning Commission approval is separately required if the lot is under 5,000 square feet, the site is subject to a D1 or D2 overlay district, the building site exceeds 15 percent slope, or the design fails neighborhood design guidelines. These are the same standards the code applies to prevent oversized single-family construction from overwhelming smaller Monterey lots, functioning as the city's mansionization control even though the code never uses that word.