Condo Conversions in Mill Valley, CA

Mill Valley regulates conversions in Chapter 20.59 of its zoning ordinance, which treats a condominium conversion as changing rental units under single ownership into units that may be sold individually, and processes it through a conditional use permit. The chapter states its purposes plainly: consumer protection for prospective purchasers and existing tenants, preserving the availability of rental units in the city, and making sure apartments being converted meet reasonable physical standards under applicable law. Before any public hearing, the Building and Zoning Code Inspector visits the site and prepares a report on the general condition of all buildings, listing code violations. Following tentative or parcel map approval, each tenant receives a written Notice of Intention to Convert. The map itself runs through the city's subdivision title.

The survey product is a condominium plan, and in California that plan defines airspace, not rooms. Unit boundaries are fixed by interior surfaces and by elevations, so ceiling and floor heights have to be measured rather than assumed, and the plan has to sort common area from exclusive-use common area: decks, carports and garage stalls, storage, stairs, and the paths between them. Mill Valley's conversion candidates are typically small buildings of two to eight units on sloping lots, where parking is tucked under the structure, units step with the grade, and no two floor plates are at the same elevation.

Our Trimble scanner handles that geometry directly. One pass through the building produces measured unit areas, ceiling elevations, and boundary surfaces, along with the carports, decks, and site improvements the plan and the map both need. Deliverables are the tentative and parcel or final map for recording with the Marin County Recorder, a condominium plan that matches the building as built, and the point cloud and scan-to-CAD floor plans for the sales and design teams. See our Mill Valley as-built surveys and parcel map vs tract map in California.