Chattanooga, TN Home Business: Signage Rules (2026)

Sec. 38-43(e) sets the accessory-use standards for a Home Occupation, and subsection (10) covers signage in a single sentence: only one non-illuminated, affixed wall sign no more than 1.5 square feet in area is permitted in association with the home occupation. That rules out freestanding yard signs, internally or externally lit signs, and any wall sign larger than roughly a foot and a half square.

The sign cap is one piece of a broader rule against advertising that a home is being used commercially. Sec. 38-43(e)(4) bars displays or activities that indicate from the exterior that a structure is being used, in part, for any purpose other than that of a residence or an accessory structure, and requires that no alteration of any structure may be made that changes the residential character of that dwelling. Read together, the two subsections mean a home business sign has to be small, unlit, flush to the wall, and effectively the only outward sign that the property is not purely residential.

A home occupation does not go through a separate sign permit process; the Land Development Office reviews the sign standard as part of the same accessory-use compliance it checks for staffing, deliveries and traffic under the rest of Sec. 38-43(e). Because the sign limit sits inside the Home Occupation accessory-use standards rather than a stand-alone sign permit, exceeding it puts the entire home occupation's status as a permitted accessory use at risk, not just the sign itself.