We welcome new contributors to this site. We’d like to publish a wide variety of experiences with ADUs. While no one’s getting paid here, you can still get the glory. 
Guidelines for posts
- Feel free to range widely in terms of content and style, but make sure whatever you write has some clear relevance to the accessory dwelling concept.
- The post should have some substance, making at least an itty bitty contribution to the amount of knowledge on the web on this subject. That doesn’t mean you have to write a phD thesis, just anything more than “hey I found this link on the web check it out.”
- The easiest way to contribute is to report your own personal experience. You might describe an accessory dwelling you built, live in, or visited (pictures are most welcome). Or your experience with a crucial issue related to accessory dwellings (financing, being a landlord/tenant, using a common yard, etc).
- If you want to write about the general benefits/drawbacks/potential/etc of ADUs, try to synthesize the issue or add intelligent commentary.
- If your business is related to accessory dwellings, that’s fine! You can promote your own service, products, or events. Just make it clear you’re promoting yourself, and provide some value to readers along the way.
- The only thing we’re shy about right now is unbuilt projects. We hope AccessoryDwellings.org can distinguish itself by publicizing dwellings that are actually being built or lived in right now. However, if you’ve got a really great unbuilt project story, let us know.
Other ways to help
- We aspire to create a good database of ADU regulations and opportunities by city, as well as a comprehensive bibliography of ADU-related research. We’d be very excited if anyone wanted to help filling in all those details.
If you’re interested in writing for the site, or helping out behind the scenes, leave a comment below and we’ll be in touch. Thanks!
- the editors
So happy to find this site. I have been researching ADUs for the past year (slowly) and believe your site will help me reach out to a broader community and find further information.
I am currently in my last semester of graduate school at The University of Texas at Austin, getting my M.S. in Community and Regional Planning. I am doing my thesis on Accessory Dwelling Units. Specifically, a program feasibility study for my hometown of Denton, Texas. The thesis will also include 2 case studies that review current programs for ADUs in the country. One of my case study sites is Santa Cruz, CA, I have not decided on the other yet. (maybe Austin’s SMART Housing program). Any suggestions on other cities with successful ADU programs??? I know Portland and Seattle have great programs but I am trying to find a city less urban or west cost. I wish Austin had a stronger program. Darn!
Again, so excited to see this site!!
Thanks!
Hi Jessica, glad to have you here. I hope you’ll find time to contribute some of what you’re discovering to the site! In fact I’ll make sure you’re invited as a contributor… look for that in your email. In terms of other cities to study, you might want to look through this bibliography I created (and you are welcome to add to as well). This thesis reviews some programs in the Boston area. This review may help you identify some other cities. I am glad you are not just focusing on Santa Cruz. For despite the wonderful publicity the Santa Cruz program has generated, it is really just one city, and the ADU phenomenon is much more widespread. Cheers! Martin
Martin, Thank you so much for all the resources. I was happy to see so many of the resources I had already downloaded on your list! I wish I found your site a year ago! I will definitely keep you updated as I discover new things.
-J
Hi,
Hope you are well!
I really enjoyed your posts on ADU’s, they show how important they are to building structures and the flexibility of modern homes.
I’m working with WhatHouse we’d love to work with AccessoryDwellings, would you be open to a guest post on your site?
Here are a couple of ideas that we think could work really well
• The opportunity for ADU extensions on new build homes
• What is more cost effective – a new build or an extension
• Trends in new housing
Just to give you a bit of background on WhatHouse in case it’s not a name
you’re familiar with. WhatHouse offers offer homebuyers looking to purchase new-build homes in the UK everything they need to help their search, from brand new builds to retirement homes.
Looking forward to hearing from you
Best,
James
sounds good, James, I’ll email you.
In Montgomery County, Maryland, the Planning Board has proposed a very modest liberalization of accessory apartment rules. Advocates for transit, tenants, and smart growth want something less restrictive. Here are my blog post on the subject and testimony being submitted to a Tuesday hearing by the Action Committee for Transit
http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/15719/legalize-two-family-houses-in-montgomery-county/
http://actfortransit.org/archives/testimonies/2012Sep11Tst2Family.html