Dearborn Heights, MI Home Business: Customer Traffic Restrictions (2026)

Section 36-143(a) sets the general standards every home occupation in Dearborn Heights must follow, and subsections (2) through (4) specifically govern the traffic a home-based business can generate. Customer and client visits are capped at 10 per day and 30 per week, with no more than two customers or clients present at the home at any given time, a limit meant to keep a home business from functioning like a walk-in storefront in a residential neighborhood. Subsection (3) requires that traffic generated by the home occupation stay no greater in volume than what a typical residence in the neighborhood would generate, and restricts deliveries to automobiles and passenger vehicles, mail carriers, and express package carriers, ruling out box trucks or other commercial delivery vehicles pulling up to a residential driveway.

Subsection (4) adds a curfew: no customer or client visits, and no deliveries tied to the home occupation, are allowed between 8:00 p.m. and 8:00 a.m., protecting neighbors from evening and overnight traffic. Subsection (d)(4) separately bars parking vehicles on site or in the street right-of-way beyond what is customary for a single-family home, which reinforces the visit caps by limiting how many vehicles can accumulate even within the daily visit ceiling. These traffic limits sit alongside the size limit in subsection (a)(1), which caps the home occupation at 15 percent of habitable floor area per floor, and work together to keep the business "clearly incidental and secondary" to the residential use.

A tutor, hairstylist, or small consulting practice run from a Dearborn Heights home needs to track both the daily and weekly visit counts, since exceeding either one, not just the two-person cap, is a separate basis for a violation.