Birmingham, AL Sign Regulations: Garage Sale Signs (2026)

Article VI, Section 2, Subsection 4 of the Zoning Ordinance, the same provision that authorizes garage and rummage sales in residential districts, sets two separate signage restrictions as conditions of the sale permit. Item h flatly prohibits any advertisement of a garage or rummage sale on public property, meaning a sign cannot be staked in a street right-of-way, median, or other city-owned land no matter how small it is. Item i then governs signs on private property: no yard sign larger than six square feet is allowed, and no illuminated or animated sign can be displayed at all, regardless of size.

Timing is also fixed rather than left to the seller's discretion. A sign cannot be put up before the date of the sale itself, and once the sale ends, every sign has to come down no later than the day following the last day of the sale, whether that sale ran one day or the full three-day maximum the ordinance allows. Because these signage terms are conditions of the same permit that authorizes the sale, a sign violation, an oversized sign, an illuminated sign, or a sign left up past the deadline, can jeopardize the underlying garage sale permit issued by the Department of Planning, Engineering and Permits, not just draw a separate citation.