Mr. Placid - and others, I want to turn my garage into a seperate apartment for a family member. Can I?

OK, here's the bottom line.

Those covenants are private. That means city hall and everyone else in the town bureaucracy doesn't give a cr*p about what is contained in your deed restrictions. Therefore, nobody at city hall is going to give you an opinion concerning your deed. The only persons that can enforce private covenants are (1) your homeowner's association, and (2) your neighbors.

So, let's say you go ahead and convert your garage, get building permit approval, etc. One of two things can then happen. (1) Your HOA doesn't care, your neighbors don't care, and nobody complains. You go on with life happily ever after. Or (2) Your HOA does care, or your neighbors care, and you are levied a fine, or alternatively sued for an injunction to force you to restore the garage. At that point, you go to court and argue that the conversion does not violate the covenants, whereas the HOA argues that the conversion does indeed violate the covenant language. It is then up to the judge to decide. What will the judge say? Who knows. Nobody is a mindreader.

One thing I can tell you is this: The public policy in most states is that use of land should be unrestricted. Covenants are a restriction, and are thus held in disfavor. Therefore, courts will usually construe covenant restrictions very narrowly. "No dogs" means cats, horses, snakes, and everything else that is not a "dog" is allowed. "No white fences" means that red, blue, black, pink, and purple fences are allowed.

If the judge rules in favor of the HOA, you will be required to restore your garage, and possibly pay fines and court costs to the association. If you win, then you get to keep the garage, and likely everyone else in your neighborhood will start turning their garages into apartment units.

So, in the words of Harry Callahan, "Do you feel lucky?"

You'll need to get a building permit from the City before you do any modifications. This will require building plans (think, floorplans) and a fee for the permit. If your building is older, a building permit would require the structure be brought up to current earthquake/electrical/plumbing codes.

If you do convert without a permit and the city finds out, you will be fined, and ordered to turn it back into a garage.

Additionally, depending on what city you're in, homes may be required to have a car-garage per house.

It can be a disaster working with the city on such things...good luck to you.

As long as you don't rent it out who cares is what most of us would think. Unfortunately, it does make it a multi family dwelling as per the definition of the word. Now you could ask the commission to rezone it because it is an existing building. But again they could deny it. Think of it this way, is their already water to the building or would you have to have pipes put in for the kitchen and bathroom? Is there already electric? or would a separate meter have to be put in. You can check to see if any multi family housing has been approved in the close proximity of your home to get a better idea of if you could get approval. If there has you have a chance, or if not I doubt they will approve it.

If you don't need to put in a bathroom and kitchen, just update it as a guest bedroom and keep it quiet. That way you are not adding an apartment just a guest room or rooms. No harm, no foul.

It is not legal in most areas, you should make sure the building department is not going to have a field day with you before you get too far.

If this person is not your child or your parent this would be a 2 family set up. 1 family does not apply to everyone remotely related to you.

You can convert your garage to a recreation room , and people can sleep there if they want if they are guests. If its longer term then you need to look at what your relationship is , and can you meet the requirements for a dwelling space, like a bathroom .