Milwaukee homeowners who want to add a small backyard home to their property could soon get the architectural plans for free. A proposal headed to the full Common Council on Nov. 4 would use a privately funded grant to pay for two standardized accessory dwelling unit designs, aiming to remove one of the biggest obstacles facing a 2025 law that has so far produced almost no new construction.
The plan calls for the Daniel W. Hoan Foundation to provide up to $10,000 to Montavius Jones's Narvarte Development to create the designs, according to Urban Milwaukee. Narvarte will work with architecture firm DreamBuilders, led by architect Nicholas Hans Robinson, on the actual plans. The package would include one design for a carriage house with a garage and one for a cottage without a garage, giving homeowners two distinct starting points depending on their lot and budget.
Jones entered a competition for innovative ideas sponsored by the Hoan Foundation and developed the idea of providing standard ADU designs for free, per the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The grant would pay only for the design work, not construction, and the city would receive a perpetual, royalty-free license to publish and distribute the plans, which residents could download for personal use and project planning, Urban Milwaukee reports.
A Law With Almost No Homes To Show For It
Milwaukee approved accessory dwelling units — also called carriage homes or granny flats — by a single vote in 2025, allowing the smaller units on the same lot as a single-family or two-family home, subject to zoning and building rules, per the same outlet's reporting. But uptake has been slow. The city has issued only one ADU permit since legalizing them, according to the Milwaukee Business Journal.
Jose Perez believes his district has the first ADU project in the works, according to Urban Milwaukee. Tanya Fonseca said the standardized plans are designed to let homeowners build ADUs without extensive city approvals, the newspaper reported, a pitch aimed directly at the paperwork and cost burdens that have kept the program nearly dormant.
Committee Signs Off, Full Council Next
The Common Council's Zoning, Neighborhoods and Development Committee unanimously endorsed the arrangement on Tuesday, clearing the way for the full council to take it up at its Nov. 4 meeting. James Bohl told fellow zoning committee members the free plans will lower construction costs for homeowners, according to the Journal Sentinel's reporting. The standardized designs are meant to fit a standard Milwaukee lot, though a civil engineer would still need to evaluate site-specific conditions and a homeowner would still need to obtain required permits, per Urban Milwaukee.
Accessory dwelling units generally fall into a few categories: internal and attached units built within an existing house or an addition, and detached units classified as external structures, according to the same reporting. They can be created using a basement or attic with proper access, built as an addition, or constructed as a standalone backyard structure, the Daily Reporter notes.
Milwaukee Isn't Alone in Chasing Backyard Homes
Milwaukee, Wauwatosa, South Milwaukee, Waukesha and Oconomowoc have all changed zoning ordinances or taken other steps in recent years to encourage ADU construction, the Daily Reporter reports. Wauwatosa began offering a limited number of $25,000 forgivable loans to help homeowners finance ADUs in 2025, but officials said only two such units were built after that city's 2019 ordinance change — a sign of how stubborn the construction gap can be even with financial incentives in place.
Shorewood's Plan Commission recommended its own ADU ordinance in late February as part of a broader push to identify additional housing opportunities, according to the Village of Shorewood, with Village Board review expected to follow. South Milwaukee has allowed ADUs in most residential districts under rules adopted that May.
The push for backyard homes comes against a backdrop of rising housing costs. Nationally, a Pew analysis highlighted by Governing found that 80% of the 346 large U.S. cities studied allow homeowners to build and rent or sell an ADU to an unrelated person, and that cities with permissive ordinances issued more than 11 times as many ADU permits per capita in 2025 as cities with restrictive rules. The same report noted that policymakers looking to boost construction might consider preapproved building plans — precisely the approach Milwaukee's committee just endorsed.
