Purple Ice Cream Stands to Boarding Houses for Three Legged Dogs. It would be worth your time and effort to either purchase, or go on line and download, the zoning regulations for your city or county. Someone at the zoning office will be able to tell you the zoning classification for your property. It might be something like,I-1 for light industrial, I-2 for heavy industrial, B-1, B2,(B for business) or even R-B (residential business).

Your next step would be to look at the "chart of permitted uses" somewhere in the back of the book. Listed down the first column will be all of the residential, commercial and industrial uses categories, and subcategories the people who wrote the regulations could think of...and some get pretty bizarre. Focus on the column with your property's zoning classification. A blank cell usually means the property isn't zoned for the corresponding activity. The legend will tell you if the activity is permitted by right, or if you need to get an approval from a city or county planning and or zoning commission.

Pitchforks & Torches! If you sell to a business that needs approval from a zoning and/or planning commission, be prepared for a fight. People don't like change. As part of the process, the zoning office will send post cards to nearby property owners. A little politicking on your part goes a long way. You may want to pay a visit to the neighbors and tell them what's going on and calm their anxieties. If you don't, they will probably show up at the zoning or planning hearing screaming bloody .... You'd prefer not to have that happen. If it does, your professional presentation, backed up by the overhead slides you've produced, will help sell the commissioners on your quest.

Note: Most zoning meetings use overhead slides. Probably better to print your Power Point presentation to overheads than to bring a laptop and a projector. You want to do your best to blend in with the back ground. Showing off your expertise in Power Point at these meetings can and probably will mark you as a "not one of us" in the minds of your angry neighbors and possibly a board member or two who just don't understand or trust high tech presentations. Yes, those people are still out there, and you probably know quite a few.

During the process you can request anything from a conditional use permit to a change of zoning. By the way, if you're going for a zoning change, you've got a better chance of having it approved if adjoining property has the same zoning you are requesting.

Heavy vs Light Industrial. Check the zoning regulations on exactly what kind of business can be put on your property before trying to market the land. There are often dust and noise restrictions that must be adhered to.

The Grandfather. If a building on your commercial lot is being used for an activity that does not conform to the present zoning regulation, a non-conforming use, you typically may sell the property to a buyer wishing to perform the same type of business. However, most zoning codes stipulate if the non-conforming use stops, you've only got six months to a year to re-start the activity, or the activity will no longer be permitted. For example, you own a three bay car repair facility that hasn't been used for years. The property that was zoned residential after your neighborhood was annexed by a city. A car repair business could not to in your building without a zoning change or a variance (permission from the commission that permits a land owner to use their property in a manner strictly prohibited by the existing zoning).