Durham, NC Home Business: Signage Rules (2026)

UDO Sec. 11.4.2, Sign Types Allowed Without a Sign Permit, lists home occupation signs as category G: 'A sign advertising a home occupation.' The standard attached to it is a single sentence with no ambiguity: 'Only one wall sign not exceeding three square feet in area shall be allowed.' That caps a home business to one sign, mounted on the wall of the dwelling rather than freestanding in the yard, and holds it to three square feet, small enough to identify the business without functioning as a commercial storefront sign.

Because home occupation signs sit in Sec. 11.4.2, the list of sign types allowed in every zoning district without a permit, a homeowner does not need to apply for a sign permit under Sec. 3.10 to put one up, provided it meets the one-sign, three-square-foot ceiling. Exceeding either limit, adding a second sign, or building one larger than three square feet, takes the sign outside the without-permit category entirely, and it would then have to qualify under a different, permitted sign type in Sec. 11.6, Signs Requiring Permits, or be removed. The provision sits alongside other unpermitted sign types in the same list, including farm signs, historic markers, and incidental directional signs, all of which carry their own separate size caps under the same section.