Elko County, NV Home Business: Zoning & Home Occupation Permits (2026)

The Board of County Commissioners writes the home occupation standard into the definitions section of the zoning title, § 4-1-9, and the definition doubles as the operating rule. A home occupation is a use otherwise allowed by law that is incidental to the primary residential purpose and does not change the residential character of the property. Paragraph (A) prohibits any addition, alteration or remodeling that would change the residential character of the premises. Paragraph (B) limits the business to not more than twenty percent of the total ground floor area of the dwelling, and that limit does not apply to childcare.

The use is named on the permitted-use lists of several zoning districts. Home occupations appear in the OS Open Space district (§ 4-2-1(A)), the SL Special Lands district (§ 4-2-2(A)), the A Agricultural-Recreational district (§ 4-2-4(A)) and the AR-CRD-1 conservation reserve district (§ 4-2-5(A)). The AR Agricultural-Residential permitted-use list in § 4-2-3(A) does not name home occupations. The Planning Commission is the body that acts on conditional uses in these districts, and the zoning title is administered through Elko County Planning and Zoning.

Paragraphs (C) through (H) of the same definition add the operating limits: unlit signs of no more than three square feet, traffic and nuisance limits, no more than one employee outside the immediate family, no outdoor storage or display, no registered vehicles over 26,000 GVWR, and one unattached storage building of not more than 1,000 square feet. This code applies only in unincorporated Elko County. The cities of Elko, Carlin, Wells and West Wendover run their own home occupation rules under their own codes.