Cass County, MO Building Setbacks & Zoning: Structure Height Limits (2026)

300 sets up the R-1 Single-Family Residential District for low-density single-family development, and its Maximum Height standard applies to every principal structure in the district: two and one-half stories measured from finished grade, not to exceed thirty-five feet at the eave of the uppermost story. Accessory buildings get a lower ceiling, one story with a maximum sidewall height of fourteen feet, though the Zoning Order allows a taller sixteen-foot sidewall if the applicant submits sealed engineered drawings for review, a provision added by Ordinance No.

23-08 in October 2023. The same section also sets the district's other dimensional standards: a front setback of twenty-five feet from the street right-of-way (with a front setback required on both sides of a corner lot), a side setback equal to ten percent of lot width but never less than six feet or more than fifteen feet, and a rear setback of thirty percent of lot depth, capped at twenty-five feet. Minimum lot area is twelve thousand five hundred square feet, with at least one hundred feet of frontage, or one hundred twenty feet for a double-frontage lot.

Nearby residential districts use the same two-and-one-half-story, thirty-five-foot formula for principal structures: the Rural (R-R) and Suburban (R-S) Districts apply the identical height cap to residences, so the thirty-five-foot eave line is the standard ceiling across Cass County's single-family zoning districts, not unique to R-1.