ADU Pass
Stuart
ADU Pass helps homeowners in Stuart, Patrick County, Virginia navigate the permit paperwork for building an accessory dwelling unit. This area covers 2 ZIP codes.
Map
ADU details
ADU legality: allowed-with-restrictions
Stuart sits under Patrick County zoning as the unincorporated county seat. Patrick County's ordinance is the authoritative regime: ADUs permitted as supplementary use in A-1 and residential districts with size cap approximately 1,000 sqft on base lots, up to approximately 1,500 sqft on qualifying agricultural parcels. SB 531's statewide by-right ADU framework takes effect July 1, 2027 and may broaden permissibility further. Patrick County PSA serves the Stuart core for water and sewer; outlying parcels are private well and septic.
Cost scenarios
| Scenario | Sq ft | Permit | Build | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| minimum | 200 | $1,750 | $41,200 | $42,950 |
| 600 | 600 | $1,750 | $123,600 | $125,350 |
| midpoint | 850 | $1,750 | $175,100 | $176,850 |
| 1000 | 1,000 | $1,750 | $206,000 | $207,750 |
| maximum | 1,500 | $1,750 | $309,000 | $310,750 |
Fee breakdown (as of 2026-05)
Permitting process
- Pre-application zoning inquiry (~7d)
Confirm parcel district (A-1, R-1, RE, etc.), ADU eligibility under Patrick County supplementary-regulation framework, floodplain status (Smith River, Mayo River, Rock Castle Creek corridors), and whether Patrick County PSA water/sewer service applies in Stuart core or whether private well/septic is required. - West Piedmont Health District onsite-sewage evaluation (if private well/septic) (~60d)
Virginia Department of Health (West Piedmont Health District office) construction permit for well and/or septic. Patrick's mountainous Blue Ridge terrain can require engineered alternative onsite-sewage systems on steep, shallow-bedrock, or seasonal-high-water sites. - Zoning Permit / Zoning Compliance application (~21d)
Patrick County Planning and Zoning review of size, placement, principal-dwelling setbacks, district eligibility, and supplementary-regulation compliance. Administrative review by Zoning Administrator when standards are met; SUP path if deviations are sought. - Building Permit application (~35d)
Patrick County Building Official intake with stamped plans per the 2021 Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code (13 VAC 5-63). Include residential site plan with setbacks, floodplain boundaries, well/septic locations, energy code compliance, and trade schedules. - Trade permits (Electrical, Plumbing, Mechanical) (~10d)
Trade permits filed by licensed Virginia contractors. Patrick County Building Official inspects trades through Certificate of Occupancy. - Floodplain Development Permit (if applicable) (~21d)
Required for any portion of a parcel within a FEMA-mapped Special Flood Hazard Area. Stuart core has limited SFHA exposure but adjacent unincorporated areas along the Smith River and tributaries do; ADUs in SFHAs must clear Base Flood Elevation plus county freeboard. - Construction inspections and Certificate of Occupancy (~14d)
Footing/foundation, framing, rough-in trades, insulation, final building, final trades. CO triggers Commissioner of the Revenue supplemental assessment per Va. Code § 58.1-3292.
Viability (permitted uses)
- Long-term rental: yes Long-term rental of an approved ADU is permitted. Virginia Residential Landlord and Tenant Act (Va. Code § 55.1-1200 et seq.) governs.
- Short-term rental: with-restrictions Patrick County regulates STR through zoning. STR of an ADU in Stuart typically requires Zoning Compliance verification; SUP may be required depending on district. Blue Ridge Parkway tourism (Mabry Mill at parkway MP 176, just north in Floyd County) drives meaningful seasonal demand into the Patrick County CDPs with foliage-season (October-November) and bloom-season (May-June) premiums. Confirm with Patrick County Planning before listing.
- Office rental: with-restrictions Detached office rental to outside tenants requires home-occupation permit or rezoning under the Patrick County home-occupation provisions.
- Home office: yes Home occupation by the owner is permitted in residential and A-1 districts with restrictions on signage, customer traffic, and outside storage.
- Studio / workshop: yes Personal studio (artist, music, woodworking) is a permitted accessory use in residential and A-1 districts.
- Agriculture: yes Agricultural / A-1 districts expressly permit farm structures, the keeping of livestock, and farm-labor housing subject to setback rules.
- Relative support: yes Family / multi-generational accessory dwelling is the most common Patrick County ADU pattern under the family-member dwelling provisions.
Contacts
Staff: Planning and Zoning (Zoning Administrator / Permit Intake), Building Official (Patrick County Building Official), Commissioner of the Revenue (Commissioner of the Revenue (supplemental assessment notification))
Utilities
- Water: Patrick County Public Service Authority (Stuart core service area) · 30d connect · $4,200
- Sewer: Patrick County Public Service Authority (Stuart core service area) · 45d connect · $6,200
- Electric: Appalachian Power Company (American Electric Power); Mecklenburg Electric Cooperative serves some rural Patrick parcels in adjacent CDPs · 30d connect · $2,400
- Gas: Bottled propane (no natural gas distribution in Stuart or rural Patrick County) · 7d connect · $1,500
Property values & taxes
Market rent by ADU size
| Sq ft | Rent |
|---|---|
| 400 | $700/mo |
| 600 | $875/mo |
| 800 | $1,050/mo |
| 1,000 | $1,225/mo |
Construction timeline
Realistic total: best 8mo · typical 13mo · worst 22mo
Patrick County's mountainous Blue Ridge terrain extends weather-window construction season (sloped sites, frost during November-March can lengthen schedules). Contractor pool is thin in rural Patrick; modular delivery is competitive given site-built contractor scarcity.
Modular pathway Virginia Industrialized Building Safety Regulations (13 VAC 5-91) · inspectors are occasional with modular
Patrick County is mountainous; route planning matters for modular delivery — US 58 east-to-west is the primary truck corridor; secondary state routes to rural CDPs have grade and turning-radius constraints. Manufacturer route surveys recommended.
Financing
State ADU loans:
- Virginia Housing first-time buyer and down-payment-assistance programs (Virginia Housing)
- USDA Rural Development Single Family Housing programs (502 Direct, 502 Guaranteed, 504 Repair) (USDA Rural Development Virginia State Office)
Insurance impact
HOA prevalence & preemption
Virginia has no HOA-ADU preemption. Stuart's HOA prevalence is very low — the housing pattern is small-town residential and rural-residential with no subdivision-HOA overlay typical.
Regulatory overlays (2)
- flood-zone — FEMA SFHA along the Smith River, Mayo River North Fork and South Fork, and Rock Castle Creek; Stuart core has limited but non-zero SFHA exposure · +30d · +8% cost
Patrick County participates in the National Flood Insurance Program. ADUs in SFHAs must clear Base Flood Elevation plus county freeboard and file Elevation Certificates. (map) - other — Blue Ridge Parkway visual / scenic corridor (parkway crosses northern Patrick County; Mabry Mill at MP 176 is just north in Floyd County)
National Park Service has no zoning authority over private adjacent parcels but cooperative coordination is standard practice for parkway-corridor projects. Stuart is central Patrick County and not in direct parkway viewshed; this overlay is more relevant to Meadows of Dan and Woolwine parcels. (map)
Technical envelope (climate & building code)
Climate & energy code
Building code
Amendments:
- Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code (13 VAC 5-63) state amendments to IRC — Virginia adopts the IRC with state-specific amendments; VUSBC removes the IRC R313 residential fire-sprinkler mandate and modifies several other provisions.
Contractor market (aggregate)
Legal history (timeline)
Current ordinance: Patrick County Zoning Ordinance (Patrick County Code, Zoning chapter), adopted 1980-01-01, last amended 2024-06-01
- 1884-01-01 — Taylorsville renamed Stuart in honor of J.E.B. Stuart (other)
The town of Taylorsville, the Patrick County seat, was renamed Stuart by act of the Virginia General Assembly in 1884 to honor Confederate cavalry general James Ewell Brown 'J.E.B.' Stuart, born 1833 at Laurel Hill plantation in southeastern Patrick County.
Effect: Identity-level event; no ADU effect, recorded for context. - 1979-01-01 — Va. Code § 15.2-2280 zoning authority codified (Dillon Rule baseline) (state-law)
Virginia delegated zoning authority to counties, cities, and towns without an ADU-specific preemption.
Effect: Patrick County regulates ADUs through its zoning ordinance; ADUs are not automatically permitted statewide. - 2026-04-14 — SB 531 (2026) — statewide by-right ADU mandate, effective July 1, 2027 (state-law)
SB 531, sponsored by Senator Surovell, enacted into law April 14, 2026, imposes a statewide by-right ADU mandate on Virginia localities meeting population thresholds set in the statute. The bill is effective July 1, 2027, giving localities a 14-15 month transition window to align local ordinances.
Effect: After July 1, 2027, Patrick County's ADU framework will be governed by SB 531's statewide floor as it applies to the county's population profile; pre-effective-date, the Patrick County Zoning Ordinance is the sole authority.
Known issues (2)
- other (since 2024-01) — West Piedmont Health District onsite-sewage queueing during spring/summer construction season can add 45-75 days to the permit timeline on rural Patrick parcels. Patrick's mountainous terrain often triggers engineered alternative onsite-sewage systems (mound systems, low-pressure dosing, drip dispersal) at 2-4x the cost of conventional gravity septic. (source)
- other (since 2024-01) — Site-built contractor pool is thin in rural Patrick County. Lead times of 4-6 months to book a qualified GC are typical. Modular delivery (Cardinal Homes in Wylliesburg ~75 mi; Clayton Homes regional dealers in NC) is competitive given the contractor scarcity.
Patrick County — county ADU rules and overlays
County ADU ordinance
Patrick County permits an 'accessory dwelling' or 'accessory apartment' as a supplementary use to a single-family detached dwelling on parcels of sufficient size in the county's Agricultural / Rural Residential and primary residential districts. The Patrick framework follows the common Virginia rural-county pattern with a more permissive flavor than tightly-zoned suburban counties: one ADU per parcel is the standard floor; the ADU must be clearly accessory (subordinate in size and use) to a principal single-family dwelling; a base size cap in the 800-1,200 square-foot range with potentially larger caps available on qualifying agricultural parcels; configuration options including attached, interior-conversion, and detached on most rural parcels (Patrick's rural lot sizes typically allow detached configuration without setback hardship); the ADU must meet the principal-dwelling setbacks for the underlying district rather than reduced accessory-structure setbacks; and the ADU cannot be subdivided off or sold separately from the principal dwelling. Because Virginia has no statewide ADU preemption (see state file stateAduLaw, citing Va. Code § 15.2-2280 et seq. as the local-zoning enabling statute and the absence of any enacted ADU floor), Patrick's ordinance is the authoritative regime on every parcel — there are no town-level alternatives because no incorporated towns exist. Patrick's ordinance text varies in terminology across amendment cycles; confirm the current text with the Patrick County Planning office before relying on a specific size threshold or configuration rule.
County regulatory overlays
Patrick County administers an overlay portfolio shaped by its mountainous Blue Ridge geography, federal lands proximity, and rural land-use base: (1) the Floodplain Overlay District tied to FEMA-mapped Special Flood Hazard Areas along the Smith River (county's primary stream corridor, drains to Henry County and the Smith Mountain Lake reservoir downstream), the Mayo River North Fork and South Fork (drains south into North Carolina), the Dan River drainage in the far southern county (drains into North Carolina then back into Virginia at the Roanoke River), and Rock Castle Creek and other interior streams; (2) Blue Ridge Parkway corridor proximity — the parkway crosses Patrick's northern boundary and the National Park Service operates a scenic-corridor coordination posture for adjacent private development, with informal NPS consultation customary for ridgeline-visible construction; (3) historic-resource sensitivity at Reynolds Homestead (the National Register-listed birthplace of R.J. Reynolds, 19th-century plantation house in Critz operated as a Virginia Tech outreach center), Bob White Covered Bridge (a National Register-listed 19th-century covered bridge in Woolwine), Laurel Hill (the birthplace of Confederate cavalry general J.E.B. Stuart, a Virginia Civil War Trails site), and other scattered National Register properties. Patrick is NOT a Tidewater Chesapeake Bay Preservation Area locality — Patrick sits in the Blue Ridge mountains far west of Tidewater, in drainage basins flowing south to the Albemarle Sound (via the Roanoke / Dan systems) and the Cape Fear (via tributaries of the Yadkin), not the Chesapeake Bay. Patrick has no coastal-commission jurisdiction, no CalFire-equivalent WUI regime, and no seismic-retrofit overlay.
County permitting (unincorporated parcels)
The Patrick County Building Official issues residential building permits for every parcel in the county. An ADU permit bundle on a Patrick County parcel typically includes: (1) a Zoning Compliance verification / Zoning Permit from Planning and Zoning confirming the ADU meets the supplementary-regulation standards (size cap, one-per-parcel, principal-dwelling setbacks, district eligibility), (2) a Building Permit from the Building Official with stamped plans, (3) trade permits for Electrical, Plumbing, and Mechanical filed by licensed Virginia contractors, (4) a Virginia Department of Health construction permit for well and/or septic on the majority of parcels — Patrick County's public water/sewer footprint is limited to portions of the Stuart corridor and a few additional service areas, so most rural parcels require a VDH evaluation, (5) a Floodplain Development Permit if any portion of the parcel is within a FEMA-mapped Special Flood Hazard Area per the county's Floodplain Ordinance (mapping along the Smith River, the Mayo River North Fork and South Fork, the Dan River drainage in the southern county, and Rock Castle Creek and other interior streams), (6) for parcels along or visible from the Blue Ridge Parkway, coordination with the National Park Service may apply for visual / scenic-corridor consultation under the parkway's adjacent-land coordination process, and (7) for parcels adjoining the North Carolina state line, additional coordination with North Carolina building / health authorities may apply for cross-jurisdictional well or septic siting.
Virginia state — ADU law and programs
State ADU law
Virginia has NOT enacted a statewide ADU preemption law. Virginia is a Dillon Rule state — localities possess only those powers expressly granted by the General Assembly — and the statutes granting zoning authority (Va. Code § 15.2-2280 et seq.) leave ADU regulation to local ordinances. ADU permission, setbacks, parking, size, and owner-occupancy rules therefore vary by county, independent city, and town. Virginia is unique in that it has 38 independent cities that function as counties (neither in nor subordinate to the surrounding county), meaning 'the county' for any given Virginia property may be an independent city rather than a true county. Several ADU preemption bills have been introduced in recent General Assembly sessions (2022 through 2025) without enactment; none have advanced past committee as of the Assembly's 2026 regular session adjournment.
State financing programs
Virginia does not operate an ADU-specific statewide loan, grant, or forgivable-loan program. Virginia Housing (formerly the Virginia Housing Development Authority, VHDA — rebranded 2020) administers general first-time-homebuyer, down-payment-assistance (DPA), mortgage-credit-certificate, and rehabilitation products that can be applied to ADU-adjacent purchases or improvements when eligibility criteria are met, but none target ADU construction as a distinct product. The Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) administers federal HOME and CDBG pass-through funds that local jurisdictions can direct toward ADU-adjacent rehab, but there is no state-level ADU-dedicated line item. Federally available products (FHA 203(k), Fannie Mae HomeReady and HomeStyle Renovation, Freddie Mac CHOICERenovation) remain the primary ADU financing path for Virginia homeowners.
State housing programs
Virginia does not run a state-level pre-approved-ADU-plan catalog, statewide impact-fee-waiver statute for ADUs, or streamlined-review mandate. State-level programs that touch ADU-adjacent policy are coordinated primarily through the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) and Virginia Housing, and act by funding or assisting local jurisdictions rather than by preemption. Local ADU activity — Arlington County's Accessory Dwellings program (detached ADUs permitted since 2008, liberalized 2020), Alexandria's accessory-dwelling ordinance, Fairfax County's accessory-living-unit program, and Charlottesville's 2021 zoning-code changes — is authorized under the localities' Va. Code § 15.2-2280 zoning authority, not by state mandate.
- DHCD Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Program — Federal CDBG funds administered by DHCD to eligible non-entitlement Virginia localities for community-revitalization, housing-rehab, and infrastructure projects. Not ADU-specific. Participating localities can direct CDBG funds toward housing-rehab projects where local policy supports ADUs.
- DHCD HOME Investment Partnerships Program — Federal HOME funds administered by DHCD to Virginia participating jurisdictions and non-profits for affordable-housing acquisition, rehab, and new construction. Not ADU-specific; can be directed to ADU-adjacent rehab at local discretion.
- Virginia Housing Commission — Permanent advisory commission of the General Assembly that studies housing-policy questions and recommends legislation. Has periodically studied ADU preemption and missing-middle housing without recommending statewide enactment as of 2026-04-21.
- Local ADU ordinances under Va. Code § 15.2-2280 authority — Not a state program — listed here because Virginia ADU policy is executed entirely at the locality level under the § 15.2-2280 zoning grant. A homeowner seeking to build an ADU consults the zoning ordinance of the specific county, city, or town where the parcel is located.
Federal (United States) — ADU-relevant rules and programs
Federal ADU law
The United States has no federal statute that directly regulates accessory dwelling unit entitlement or design. Land-use authority over ADUs resides with states and local governments under the traditional police power. Federal engagement is limited to financing (Fannie/Freddie/FHA/VA/USDA), flood insurance (FEMA/NFIP), and discretionary housing programs (HUD), which are recorded in sibling sections of this file.
Federal financing programs
Federal housing-finance agencies and GSEs set nationwide underwriting rules that govern whether an ADU can be financed, appraised, and counted toward mortgage qualifying income. The relevant actors are Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, FHA (HUD), VA, and USDA Rural Development.
Federal tax credits
There is no ADU-specific federal tax credit. ADUs may incidentally qualify for existing federal energy-efficiency and clean-energy tax credits when the ADU construction includes qualifying measures.
Federal housing programs
HUD administers several discretionary programs that can fund ADU-related activity at the grantee's election, but none is an ADU-specific program.
ZIP Codes
- 24082
- 24171
Post Office
- 101 N Main St, 24171