Ridgewood, NJ Home Business: Home Daycare (2026)

§ 190-124, Special regulations for certain uses and structures, sets Subsection B aside for family day-care homes contained in a residence, applying wherever such a use is otherwise permitted by the zone. The provision is built to keep the use invisible from the street: there must be no physical evidence of the use from the exterior of the residential building, any remodeling done to create the impression of business activity from the outside is prohibited, and signs of any kind advertising the nonresidential use are barred outright.

Staffing is limited to household members: no family day-care home shall have the services of any person not residing therein, which rules out hiring an outside aide or assistant on the premises. Physically, the use is confined to the ground floor and capped by size: a family day-care home shall be limited to the first floor of the residence and shall not occupy more than 25% of the habitable floor area of the residence or 50% of the habitable floor area on the ground floor, whichever is less, meaning the smaller of those two ceilings controls in every case.

The section sits among a cluster of other special-use standards in § 190-124, including residential cluster development and car rental establishments, all layered on top of the base zone regulations rather than replacing them.