What can the City do to make it easier to build an Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) in Flagstaff?

Image credit: "Accessory Dwelling Unit" by Sightline Institute is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Survey Purposes: 
We want to hear from the Flagstaff community about your experience with Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs). This survey will help the city learn more about residents’ interests in living in and building an ADU, the challenges in building an ADU, what the city can do to make it easier to build an ADU, and what would incentivize property owners to rent ADUs as a medium or long-term rental (lease length of more than 30 days).

Please take a moment to complete this brief 10- to 15-minute survey. Due to the more personal nature of the questions, individual responses will not be visible publicly. Responses will also not be used for monitoring purposes. Instead, responses will be compiled and analyzed as a group, and the results of the group analysis will be posted publicly. We appreciate your time and value your feedback.  

Survey Introduction: 
Flagstaff is challenged by a limited housing supply and high housing costs. Housing affordability and supply depend on many factors, including land use regulations, the cost of materials, labor, and infrastructure, the availability of land, housing density, and more.  While housing costs are generally beyond local control, there are things the City of Flagstaff can do to affect the cost and availability of housing.

Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) are a second and complete living space on a property that already has a single-family home. ADUs can take several forms: they can be a portion of a home converted to a separate living unit, an addition to a home, or a living space in a stand-alone structure permanently affixed to the land and connected to utilities. ADUs are smaller than the primary home, so they are often more affordable to rent. They can provide benefits like supplemental income or social connections, as ADUs may allow extended family members, friends, or aging parents, for example, to live nearby.

The City of Flagstaff’s Carbon Neutrality Plan and 10-Year Housing Plan identify ADUs as important means to address the City’s carbon neutrality and housing affordability goals. Because ADUs are located on established properties with existing homes, ADUs are built in neighborhoods that already have infrastructure, access to transit, and other services. ADUs can also reduce traffic, by creating new housing in closer-in existing neighborhoods that are closer to jobs and schools, rather than further-flung new neighborhoods.