Fairfax County supervisors on Monday will consider closing a legal loophole that has allowed some homeowners to tear down their houses and build enormous new structures under the guise of “additions.”
The county now is receiving an average of three permit applications a week for additions to single-family homes that, in reality, result in “an entirely new house constructed on an existing foundation,” according to county documents.
It’s a way some residents have avoided the more extensive permit and inspection process that would accompany building an entirely new home.
Some of the projects are large enough to invite the label of “McMansion,” a pejorative term that describes the type of uniform, expansive dwellings that have proliferated in recent years in some parts of Northern Virginia. These new dwellings are in some cases too large for the old power, water and sewer connections they’re built on top of, according to the county.
Lee District Supervisor Dana Kauffman, who has committed a large part of his final term in office to reforming how the county enforces its own regulations, brought the problem to light.
Instead of “additions,” Kauffman calls the projects “multiplications,” referring to the size of some of the new structures.
Under the proposed regulation, smaller jobs such as a new garage would be legally distinguished from ground-up overhauls, which would be subjected to the same codes governing the construction of a new house.
“It’s an attempt to ensure that folks can’t avoid vitally needed inspection and zoning conformance,” Kauffman told The Examiner on Friday. “We don’t want death traps or hotels to become commonplace.”
