Montgomery, AL Home Business: Zoning & Home Occupation Permits (2026)

Under the Montgomery Zoning Ordinance's definitions section, a "home occupation" must be conducted entirely within the dwelling and carried on solely by the person who lives there. The use can occupy no more than 25 percent of the dwelling's total floor area, and it must stay clearly incidental and secondary to the dwelling's residential purpose, meaning it cannot change the character of the home. The ordinance lists acceptable examples: dressmaking, taking in boarders, leasing or renting rooms, tutoring, and teaching the fine arts. It expressly excludes a beauty parlor, furniture upholstering, or a professional office from qualifying as a home occupation, since those uses are treated as commercial activity that exceeds the incidental-use test.

Article VII, Section 1 (Regulations Applying to All Districts) confirms that home occupations are a use permitted by right, alongside public utilities, public buildings, recreational facilities, and accessory structures, meaning a resident does not need a rezoning or a use variance to operate one as long as it stays inside the definitional limits. Because home occupations sit in the "permitted" category rather than the "permitted on appeal" category (which covers uses like general hospitals or semipublic buildings), no board of adjustment hearing is required for a compliant home occupation, but an occupation that exceeds the 25 percent floor-area cap or allows public display of goods no longer qualifies under the definition and falls outside the by-right allowance.