Farmington Hills, MI Short-Term Rentals: Parking Rules (2026)

Farmington Hills regulates off-street parking through Chapter 34 (Zoning) Article 5, which establishes parking ratios by use category. For single-family detached dwellings - the typical Farmington Hills STR property under the September 2023 owner-occupied framework - the ordinance generally requires two off-street parking spaces per dwelling unit, satisfiable through any combination of garage spaces, driveway pad, and code-conforming paved parking surface. The standard does not include a per-bedroom or per-guest-room additive ratio for STR use because the ordinance treats lawful (owner-occupied) STR activity as ancillary to the residential use, not as a separate use category requiring its own ratio. The non-owner-occupied STR use category (treated as 'Motel' under the revised Chapter 34 Article 2 Section 2.2 definition) is not permitted in residential districts at all, so the more intensive commercial motel parking standard does not come into play for the residential side of the city. The Chapter 9 Housing Code rental registration inspection checks for the continued availability and condition of the off-street parking facilities; an owner who has paved over the driveway, removed the garage capacity, or otherwise rendered the off-street spaces inoperable can be cited at reinspection and the Certificate of Compliance can be conditioned on parking restoration. On-street parking by STR guests is governed by Chapter 22 (Traffic and Motor Vehicles) of the Farmington Hills Code and by Michigan motor vehicle law: no blocking driveways or fire hydrants, no parking within set distances of intersections or crosswalks (typically 30 feet of stop signs, 20 feet of crosswalks under the Michigan Vehicle Code), no parking against the flow of traffic, no parking on sidewalks, no overnight on-street parking on streets posted with overnight parking bans (many Farmington Hills residential streets carry seasonal overnight parking restrictions tied to snow removal), and compliance with any neighborhood-specific time-limit or permit-zone restrictions. The Farmington Hills Police Department enforces these standards through citations issued by patrol officers or by the Parking Enforcement function. HOA covenants in many Farmington Hills subdivisions (Independence Commons, Ramblewood, Independence Village, Stratford, and many Lakeview-area subdivisions) impose stricter parking rules independent of the city code, including: bans on on-street parking by residents and guests, prohibitions on commercial vehicles or trailers parked at the property, vehicle-count caps per household, and requirements that vehicles be parked only in driveways or garages. These covenants are enforced privately by the HOA with covenant remedies including fines, towing, and litigation. Patterns of guest-parking complaints tied to a specific Farmington Hills STR are tracked by the Building Division as nuisance evidence and can support non-renewal of the Certificate of Compliance at the 3-year mark.