ADU rules in Pueblo

Ordinance No. 11022 (adopted August 25, 2025, Pueblo's HB24-1152 compliance ordinance) allows one ADU, including a detached backyard unit, as an accessory use to a one-family residence in every zone district where a one-family residence is allowed, including Planned Unit Development districts that allow one-family homes. The use table lists the ADU use as permitted by right in the agricultural districts A-1 through A-4, residential districts R-1, R-2, R-2U, R-3, R-4, R-5, R-6 and R-8, plus RCN, B-1, B-2 and both CCN districts. The lot must contain a site-built single-family home or a manufactured home on a permanent foundation; lots holding a duplex, townhouse, multi-family building, mobile home or RV do not qualify. A detached ADU is defined as sharing no common wall with the house.

The code defines three ADU types and allows all of them on the same terms: attached (shares at least one wall with the house and expands its footprint), detached, and integrated (contained entirely within the existing house, for example a basement unit, with no footprint increase). Attached ADUs must meet the zone district's maximum building height and its rear-yard setback, and must be architecturally compatible with the house, meaning similar exterior siding materials and colors and similar roofing materials and colors.

The ADU's gross floor area may not exceed 100 percent of the gross floor area of the one-family residence on the same lot or 800 square feet, whichever is less, so a small house caps the ADU below 800 square feet. A detached ADU may not be taller than the house, while an attached ADU may go up to the zone district height limit. Detached ADUs 16 feet tall or lower may sit as close as 5 feet to the rear property line; taller detached units must meet the zone's normal rear setback (typically 15 feet per the city staff report), and all ADUs must meet the zone's front and side setbacks. HB24-1152 expressly lets cities cap ADUs at the primary home's size and anywhere above 750 square feet, so both prongs of Pueblo's cap are consistent with state law.

Pueblo imposes no ongoing owner-occupancy requirement on either the house or the ADU. The owner must only demonstrate occupancy of the lot at the time of applying to add an ADU to a lot that already contains a home or to convert part of an existing home; acceptable proof includes a utility or medical bill, first-class mail, or bank statement showing the property address and dated within 12 months of the application. Because the requirement covers only those two situations, it does not apply to an ADU built simultaneously with a new house, and nothing requires the owner to keep living on the property afterward. This mirrors C.R.S. 29-35-403 (HB24-1152), which bars subject jurisdictions like Pueblo from mandating owner occupancy but allows exactly this application-time residency check.

One off-street space must be built only when all three conditions are met: the lot has no existing off-street space that could serve the ADU (an existing driveway, garage or tandem space counts), the lot is in a zone that as of January 1, 2024 required at least one space for the house (Pueblo requires one space per one-family dwelling citywide under §17-4-42(a)), and the lot is on a block where on-street parking is prohibited. If those conditions are not met but the lot already has an off-street space beyond what is designated for the house, that existing space must simply be designated for the ADU; no new construction is required. This tracks the parking limits C.R.S. 29-35-403 places on HB24-1152 subject jurisdictions, and the city staff packet includes a map of the blocks where on-street parking is prohibited.

The use table lists 'Residence, accessory dwelling unit' as a permitted use by right (P) in every district where one-family residences are allowed, and §17-4-16(a) grants the use across all such districts including PUDs. Review is administrative: zoning review by city Planning and Community Development plus a building permit issued through the Pueblo Regional Building Department (Southern Colorado Building Department). Per the city's staff report implementing HB24-1152, approval can be elevated to a public hearing only when the lot is in a Historic District, the property is a designated historic property, or the proposal cannot be approved without a variance.

The ADU ordinance places no restrictions on renting the ADU; its only ownership rule is that the ADU cannot be sold separately from the house and the lot cannot be subdivided to split ownership. Pueblo's municipal code contains no short-term rental licensing scheme, no STR zoning use category, and no ADU-specific STR restriction; full-text searches of the code for short-term rental, vacation rental, vacation home and homestay return nothing. Short stays fall under the city's 4.3 percent lodger's tax on lodging transactions (§14-9-3), a revenue measure rather than a land-use control. C.R.S. 29-35-403 would let Pueblo require the owner to reside on the parcel before granting an STR license, but the city has no such license program in its code as of Supp. No. 109.