Delaware County

Village of Hancock, NY: zoning for new construction

5 districts

The Village of Hancock carries 5 zoning districts, each setting its own lot size, setbacks and height for what you can build. No local short-term-rental law on record - which is not the same as permission. The district table below has the setbacks, height limits and coverage - confirm the specifics with the building department before you rely on a figure.

Looking specifically at an accessory dwelling unit? See ADU rules for Hancock →

Zoning districts

District	Min lot	Setbacks F / S / R	Max height	ADU
R1 Residential — the Village's primary residential district. Minimum lot 6,500 square feet (0.15 acres) with 65 feet of width. Maximum occupancy 35% — the schedule's "Maximum Occupancy (percentage)" column is a building-coverage maximum and is recorded as maxLotCoverage. Front setback 25 feet; side yards stated as "10/10", meaning 10 feet on EACH side (the recorded figure is the one-side value); rear 35 feet, which is deeper than the rear yard in every other district here and deep for a 65-foot-wide lot, so check it before siting. Maximum building height 35 feet. Off-street parking 1 1/2 spaces per dwelling unit. One- and two-family dwellings are permitted BY RIGHT — a two-family needs no special permit and takes no additional land, which makes R1 unusually friendly to a duplex. A long special-permit list sits alongside it (group homes and retirement homes, which take a wider 15/15 side yard and a 25-foot rear; home occupations, public schools, churches, cemeteries, public swimming pools, public parks, golf courses, commercial greenhouses, campgrounds, canoe liveries, medical facilities, bed-and-breakfasts and public utilities). § 115-26 exempts belfries, church spires, cupolas, domes not used for human occupancy, chimneys, ventilators, skylights, antennas, tanks and roof-mounted mechanical appurtenances from the height limit. No ADU — see aduNotes.	0.1492 ac	25 / 10 / 35 ft	35 ft	No
R2 Residential — the Village's denser residential district, sharing R1's 6,500 square feet (0.15 acres) and 65 feet of width, 35% maximum occupancy, 25-foot front and 10-foot side yards, but with a shallower 25-foot rear yard. One- and two-family dwellings by right. Its value over R1 is the SPECIAL PERMIT list, which is the Village's only route to real density: MULTIFAMILY DWELLINGS, THREE- AND FOUR-FAMILY DWELLINGS BY CONVERSION, MOBILE HOME PARKS and HOTELS/MOTELS, all subject to Article VII, § 115-41 et seq., which Schedule A expressly defers to ("See standards specific to special permit uses in Article VII"). THE RECORDED 15-FOOT HEIGHT IS WHAT THE SCHEDULE SAYS AND IT IS ANOMALOUS — TREAT IT AS A FLAG, NOT A FACT. The Maximum Building Height column reads 15 feet for R2 against 35 for R1 and GB and 25 for Industrial. It was read twice by independent character-offset slicing of the schedule's own per-page headers and both agree, and it is not a footnote marker glued to a smaller number: the schedule has only two footnotes, one about use categories and one about parking review, neither touching height. But 15 feet is barely a single storey and it sits in the one district that permits multifamily, hotels and motels, which it plainly cannot accommodate. Either the code contains a typographical error or Article VII overrides it for those uses. CONFIRM WITH THE VILLAGE BEFORE RELYING ON EITHER READING.	0.1492 ac	25 / 10 / 25 ft	15 ft	No
GB General Business — the Village's general commercial district, which also permits one- and two-family dwellings BY RIGHT, so it is a genuine residential option and not a commercial-only zone. Minimum lot 10,000 square feet (0.23 acres) with 80 feet of width — the largest residential-capable minimum in the Village. Maximum occupancy 35%. Front setback 25 feet, side yards 15 feet each ("15/15"), rear 25 feet. Maximum building height 35 feet. Off-street parking 1 1/2 spaces per dwelling unit, subject to schedule note 2, under which the PLANNING BOARD reviews the site plan or proposed parking availability to confirm the provision suits both the size and the use of the site — so the 1 1/2 figure is a floor the Board may effectively raise. No ADU — see aduNotes.	0.2296 ac	25 / 15 / 25 ft	35 ft	No
Schedule A spans the entire lot-size and setback block of the DB row with a single sentence: "Due to the nature of the downtown business area, there are no minimum lot sizes." So minimum lot area, lot width, front, side and rear setbacks and maximum occupancy are all genuinely unset — a downtown infill lot is not constrained by them, and recording zeros or borrowed figures here would invent a constraint the Village removed on purpose. The two standards that DO bind are MAXIMUM BUILDING HEIGHT 35 FEET and OFF-STREET PARKING of 2 spaces. Permitted and special permit uses are "All uses permitted in GB District" and "All uses as permitted in GB District" respectively, and site plan review is "Same as in GB District" — so DB is GB's use list with GB's site-plan trigger and none of GB's bulk. Since GB permits one- and two-family dwellings by right, so does DB, which makes this the least dimensionally constrained residential-capable land in the Village. No ADU — see aduNotes.	—	—	35 ft	No
Industrial District — the only district measured in acres rather than square feet: minimum lot 1 ACRE with 150 feet of width, and the highest coverage allowance in the Village at 50% maximum occupancy. Front setback 35 feet, side 25 feet, rear 25 feet. Maximum building height 25 feet, which is LOWER than the 35 feet allowed in R1, GB and DB — unusual for an industrial district and a real constraint on anything needing clear internal height. Off-street parking 1 space per unit of the applicable measure. Industrial uses are subject to site plan review, and LOGGING is called out as a separate special permit use, which fits a Delaware River village surrounded by working forest. Non-residential district — no ADU.	1 ac	35 / 25 / 25 ft	25 ft	No

Short-term rentals

No local short-term-rental law on record - which is not the same as permission. NO short-term-rental provision exists in the zoning chapter or anywhere else in the Village Code — a searched negative, not an unchecked field. The only transient-lodging use is § 115-47 Hotels and motels, a special permit use in R2, GB and DB. WHAT DOES EXIST IS CHAPTER 83, RENTAL DWELLING UNIT REGISTRATION — a general rental regime (§ 83-1 purpose and authority, § 83-4 application for registration, § 83-5 term of the registration certificate, § 83-6 revocation) that reaches rental dwelling units generally, with no term threshold distinguishing short from long stays. It is not an STR law and confers no zoning permission, but any rental will need a Ch. 83 registration certificate. ABSENCE IS NOT PERMISSION: recorded unknown rather than permitted. Hancock sits on the Delaware River with canoe liveries and campgrounds among its special permit uses, so it is a plausible STR market and the Village may have acted since; confirm before underwriting STR income.

Good to know

Last reviewed2026-08-18

Working out a budget? A standard-finish build here runs $191–$250/sq ft - see the full cost to build a house in Hancock, or what an ADU costs here.

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