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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 12:50 AM
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"H" Zoning

Does anyone know exactly what is permitted within a building with an "H" Zoning?

I've had a look on the myhamilton website. I can find H zone districts, but not individual H zoned buildings.
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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 1:03 AM
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H Districts - Community Shopping and Commercial
http://www.myhamilton.ca/NR/rdonlyre...MSECTION14.pdf
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  #3  
Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 1:12 AM
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Originally Posted by SteelTown View Post
H Districts - Community Shopping and Commercial
http://www.myhamilton.ca/NR/rdonlyre...MSECTION14.pdf
That's what I saw, but it says districts, not buildings.

What if you have a building that's zoned for one thing inside a zone that's zoned something else?
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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 1:15 AM
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I don't think you can have a building inside a zone that's zoned for something else. You need to get council to change the zoning.
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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 1:23 AM
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Originally Posted by SteelTown View Post
I don't think you can have a building inside a zone that's zoned for something else. You need to get council to change the zoning.
OK... How do you explain corner shops? Or the mix of single family residences and shops and businesses on various streets in Hamilton. Cannon for example.

Take a street with mainly single or multi family residences and suddenly you see that one house has a business operating in the ground floor. That building will have a different zoning to the district's overall zoning, right?

Which is why I'm confused by the use of district zoning as opposed to purely building zoning.
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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 1:39 AM
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A site plan can have blocks with different zoning.
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Old Posted Nov 6, 2009, 2:18 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SteelTown View Post
A site plan can have blocks with different zoning.
So. A person can have their lot zoned as its own little district
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Old Posted Nov 7, 2009, 2:13 AM
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Quote:
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So. A person can have their lot zoned as its own little district
It's individual properties that are zoned not districts. The city has guidelines, but they are only guidelines, they are not set in stone. If the property owner requests a change of zoning it is usually approved. There has to be some serious concerns before an application for rezoning is rejected.
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Old Posted Nov 8, 2009, 12:35 AM
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Originally Posted by bigguy1231 View Post
It's individual properties that are zoned not districts. The city has guidelines, but they are only guidelines, they are not set in stone. If the property owner requests a change of zoning it is usually approved. There has to be some serious concerns before an application for rezoning is rejected.
Different zonings have different taxation rates. H Zoning has quite high taxation rates. However the cost of changing an H Zoned building to a single family residence is quite high in terms of money and effort. Apparently you have to retain an architectural technologist, have a floorplan drawn, then submit these plans and obtain a building permit. Just to change a tick box.
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Old Posted Nov 8, 2009, 1:38 AM
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Thanks for posting that info, omro. I'm always glad to learn more about anything to do with costs/risks and processes related to real estate purchases.
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Old Posted Nov 8, 2009, 2:50 AM
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Originally Posted by holymoly View Post
Thanks for posting that info, omro. I'm always glad to learn more about anything to do with costs/risks and processes related to real estate purchases.
I'll be speaking to the city's zoning advisor on Monday, she wasn't available last week when I tried to call her and ended up speaking to one of the building inspectors. She may have different information and I'll update this thread as I learn more.
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  #12  
Old Posted Nov 8, 2009, 3:07 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by omro View Post
Different zonings have different taxation rates. H Zoning has quite high taxation rates. However the cost of changing an H Zoned building to a single family residence is quite high in terms of money and effort. Apparently you have to retain an architectural technologist, have a floorplan drawn, then submit these plans and obtain a building permit. Just to change a tick box.
I know it can be a lengthy and costly process. But unless there are legitimate concerns by city staff, and locals, council usually rubber stamps rezoning requests. The property owner still has to go through the process though.

I think I read somewhere it costs $20,000 to have a property rezoned.

Last edited by bigguy1231; Nov 8, 2009 at 6:55 PM.
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Old Posted Nov 13, 2009, 2:01 PM
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The city are being really tedious with their lack of assistance at the moment.

I'm trying to find out whether I can get a residential mortgage on a H zoned property if I have the taxation classed as 100% residential.

Say you buy a mixed use building that is in a state of disrepair, you can only get a private mortgage on the place at a high rate of interest. Unless the building is earning income from the residential or commerical section of the property, no institution is even vaguely interested.

And in order to convert a mixed use building, legally, from a half commercial/residential split to 100% residential you have to do the following:

- retain the services of an architectural technologist. $3000-$3500. Draw up plans for conversion (3 weeks).
- submit plans and get a building permit (3 weeks) $204. If creating residential space from an area that has not been used for either purpose before, i.e. basement or attic space the permit cost is an additional $11 per square metre.
- do all necessary renovation work to complete conversion of commercial section to residential.
- have the building assessed by MPAC.
- submit letter to say the building is now 100% residential.
- wait 6 months for the tax class conversion to be processed.

The whole time you have to pay both the residential and commerical taxes, though you can claim back a portion of the commercial taxes if the building is unoccupied. And you can claim back the balance between commerical and residential after the class conversion is processed retroactively from the first day of the letter being submitted.

However, at no point can the city tell me if this building is now eligible for a residential mortgage which the city deem to be district based, not building based.

To change zoning is yet further expense.

So what incentive is there for anyone to take over a mixed use building in an H zoned district, that's sat there mouldering away, and breathe life back into it? Or to do all of this legitimately. The timescales make the costs prohibitively expensive.
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Old Posted Nov 13, 2009, 2:22 PM
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Quote:
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So what incentive is there for anyone...to do all of this legitimately.
Aye, there's the rub.
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Old Posted Nov 14, 2009, 5:22 AM
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Aye, there's the rub.
I'm kinda over it.

At least I found a mortgage broker today who was able to confirm that if the building is reclassified as 100% residential for taxation, then the zoning doesn't have to be changed. However, effort that it will take to make the building fully residential..... *sigh*
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Old Posted Nov 14, 2009, 5:31 AM
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That kind of zone here (NCx, Neighbourhood Commercial and GCx, General Commerical) allow residential uses, in the case of a NC2 and GCx, however, at least 50% of the building's floor area must be devoted to commercial uses. (On my street, most of these have vacant ground levels.) This allows a store to have apartments above and below it, or in many cases here, a house to have a commercial space on its main floor while the family lives in the rest of the building. (That is, the store is just a room of their house.) I think all of our residential zones also allow limit commercial uses within certain development parameters as well. Hamilton must have similar zone restrictions.

Site plans don't have blocks with different zoning here, but different restrictions (within the guidelines of the zone) can exist on the same lot with the same zone class. An apartment complex to be debated next month will be all zoned RM2 (medium density apartments) but half of the lot will only allow apartment blocks, and half will only allow townhouses. If a place has a different zone, it is a different lot, but it can be owned by the same owner as the one next door and "blend" into the development. (Our Superstore is on about 200 small lots that were originally zoned for houses--apparently that was easier than combining them all into a single lot; and Victoriaville, our downtown mall, is a single building on a variety of lots, its hallways are zoned as streets and the buildings are zoned as Central Business District.)

Bureaucracy.
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Old Posted Sep 21, 2011, 5:22 PM
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Sorry to bump up an old thread. This is one of the top results when googling for "Hamilton zoning H." Unsurprising how much the city website stinks!

Looking at this property (http://www.icx.ca/propertyDetails.as...Key=1108867737), it says it's zoned H, however it's a two unit multi-family house. Is this an incorrect zoning? I thought things could be zoned residential up until five units? How much would it cost to get it zoned properly, so a potential owner doesn't have to pay the higher property taxes?
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  #18  
Old Posted Nov 12, 2011, 7:23 PM
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FWIW... and i realise this is an old thread...
IMHO this is an ill-advised venture.
properties that are zoned "H" in a residential area are usually zoned that way because of some extenuating circumstance that makes them undesireable for a strictly residential dwelling.
in the case of a mixed use building on Cannon st. (in its current express one-way use) an "H" zoning makes sense here because of the very good commercial exposure from high density vehicular traffic. in terms of residential use, these buildings suck the big one. who wants to be woken up at four in the morning by a harley or a rice rocket every night?
this would also explain the typical run-down nature of mixed use houses on a busy street. many of these houses were built before high traffic noise was a problem and had to be adapted to mixed-use because no one who could afford to live in a quiet setting would tolerate it. this means low rents and obnoxious, loud neighbours who trash their apartments and keep water heaters and upside-down baby carriages on their front porches.
that is not to say there aren't any sad looking houses that could be brought back to magnificence by a motivated and responsible owner.
but we are looking down the barrel of another economic meltdown. one cannot afford to overlook the future value of a home unless one is already well-established and not about to take on a huge mortgage expense they will be responsible for decades down the road. it costs very little to live once a mortgage is paid off. but if you are five years into a mortgage and lose your job or get divorced, can you afford to put your house on the market and have it sit there for months, and in some cases years, without so much as a walk-through?
likely not.
you will probably have to firesale it to get it sold and take a huge haircut on your investment. you could be left with a mortgage you still owe money on and no home to show for it.
a young person with little or no equity cannot afford to buy a home these days without carefully considering future value. busy streets kill value, especially in bad neighborhoods. if you rent out part of a house and collect rent, and use the rest for yourself and a home business, a H zoned house makes sense if you can put down 35%. but god help you if you buy such a home and spend $20K removing the H zoning and any other such features which may make it desireable to anyone. The permitted commercial uses that come with an "H" zoning are usually the only thing these sad houses have going for them.
my advice is to leave such ventures to those who are independently wealthy and can afford to do it.
first, get a mortgage broker who will explain mortgages to you and get pre-approved for a set value so you know your budget. ask lots of questions just like these ones. then get a good realtor who will represent you as a buyer and is willing to discuss with you what you really want out of a home, and let them find one for you. commissions are the responsibility of the seller so it won't cost you anything. hamilton has a ton of character homes and you will eventually find one you can be proud of, if you know what to look for and be patient. good luck.
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