Straight answers
What is the maximum size of a laneway home in Burnaby?
There is no fixed maximum floor area. Burnaby removed maximum floor area requirements in June 2024 and now regulates these homes as rear principal buildings in the R1 Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing District, so height, setbacks and lot coverage define what fits. Rear buildings run to 7.5 metres with a sloping roof, 7.0 metres with a flat roof, over two storeys inclusive of the basement. The fixed square-metre cap that applied before June 2024 still appears on many pages and no longer applies.
Figures verified against the sources below · August 31, 2026
01 — The longer answer
How Burnaby regulates these homes now
Burnaby no longer refers to these as laneway homes: they are regulated the same as other principal buildings, and they are permitted on lots without lanes. Lane access is not required.
Because the limit is now geometric rather than a number, what fits depends on your lot's dimensions and the main house's footprint. We run the setback and coverage arithmetic for your address as part of the free feasibility review.
Do not read Burnaby's rules across to Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam or Port Moody. The four diverged after the province's small-scale multi-unit housing legislation, and a figure from one is not a guide to another.
02 — Where to go next
03 — Sources
Each figure above links to the authority it came from.
City of Burnaby: laneway homes are now regulated the same as other principal buildings and are no longer referred to as laneway homes; permitted including on lots without lanes
burnaby.caBurnaby R1 Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing District summary: maximum floor area requirements removed, with no set limit beyond permitted height, setbacks and lot coverage; rear principal buildings 7.5 m above grade, 0.5 m less for flat roofs, two storeys inclusive of basement
burnaby.ca
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