Small Lot Amnesty: Making Room for More Affordable Homes

Finding three lots beneath one house

DWD Development, led by David Whitworth, was known for finding underutilized properties and adapting them to accommodate more homes. His interest in affordability through density also reflected a broader goal: making fuller use of existing streets and utilities instead of extending development farther into undeveloped land.

Some properties contained three original 25-foot-wide lots, with an older single-story house occupying the middle lot or spanning the group. The lots had never been legally combined. Removing the house made it possible to consider a separate home on each original lot; this was not a subdivision creating three new parcels.

Working with the original plat

Austin’s Small Lot Amnesty provisions allowed qualifying older lots to be developed despite falling short of the usual lot-width requirements. Minimum floor-area allowances also allowed these small lots a higher effective floor-area ratio than a proportional limit alone would have provided.

Our architectural work translated those provisions into approximately 15-foot-wide, shotgun-style homes. Detached rear garages provided space for an apartment or studio above. Front porches gave each narrow home an entrance facing the neighborhood.

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Northfield narrow-lot home with a traditional porch and individual street presence

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More housing on land already served

More homes could share the underlying land investment and use an established neighborhood’s streets and services. Living space above a garage added accommodation without requiring a separate building footprint.

Here, “more affordable” describes that relative opportunity. These homes were not presented as income-restricted housing, and actual costs depend on land, construction, financing, and the market.

A project that put the rules to the test

The homes drew attention because they raised a question about the purpose of Small Lot Amnesty. Critics understood the provision as a way to permit construction on older, undersized lots—not as a reason to remove an existing house and replace it with several homes on the original platted lots.

DWD saw an opportunity to accommodate more households on land already served by streets and utilities. The disagreement centered on whether that additional housing justified replacing the existing house and changing the pattern of development.

Our work with DWD became an early, publicly debated example of that approach. Coverage in the Austin Business Journal and Austin American-Statesman brought the small-lot housing debate to a wider audience.

Different rules. The same careful investigation.

Austin’s ordinances change. For each new project, we examine the provisions applicable to the property—including permitted housing types, lot dimensions, floor-area allowances, setbacks, parking, and available exceptions or incentives. We test how those provisions work together with trees, access, utilities, and the spaces people need inside their homes.

The goal is to make full use of what the property allows while creating homes people want to live in. That may mean another residence, a more useful floor plan, or a different arrangement of buildings and outdoor space.

If you are evaluating an Austin property, bring us the address, a survey if available, and what you hope to build. We can help investigate its development potential under the rules in effect when your project proceeds.