Dearborn Heights, MI Sign Regulations: Garage Sale Signs (2026)

Sec. 26-10(4) of the City Code carves out a specific exemption in the sign chapter for garage, rummage, yard, attic, flea market, estate sale, lawn or similar sale signs, letting residents post them without a permit despite the general prohibitions in Sec. 26-11. The sign cannot exceed three square feet, and it cannot stay on the property for more than three days, and those three days must correspond with the sale itself, so a sign cannot be posted well before or left up well after the sale.

The same subsection bars posting these signs on public property, in the public right-of-way or a street easement, on telephone, electric, streetlight or traffic control poles or related equipment, on a public tree, or on an official sign of the state or a political subdivision. This mirrors the residential-sale rule in Sec. 25-100(b), which separately requires any sale sign to come down within 24 hours after the sale and to have the property owner's consent if it sits on someone else's land. The Building and Engineering Department enforces Chapter 26, and because signs are a Class C classified chapter under Sec.

1-11(e), a violation, an oversized sign, a sign left up past the sale, or one on a utility pole, is a municipal civil infraction fined $200 for a first offense, $400 for a second, and $800 for a third or subsequent offense within a year.