Coach Houses for Rent in Chicago

The coach house for rent in Chicago is a familiar dwelling type for many apartment renters who might have grown up in the city or the close-collar suburbs of Chicago. Chicago has a pretty interesting assortment of properties for renters to look at for coach houses. What are coach houses in Chicago? Coach houses are separate apartments usually located above a garage or a smaller annex behind the property’s main building. Homeowners would either lease out their coach house apartments to renters or use them as housing for family members. This is one possible explanation for where the term “in-law suite” got coined -- as well as the potential origin for the names granny houses and granny flats -- as many multigenerational households in Chicago would remodel a basement, garage, or attic space to accommodate members of the extended family and allow for everyone to live within the same property but in separate apartments.

New construction of coach houses, granny houses, or other Accessory Dwelling Units was banned in the City of Chicago after 1957 when the city passed a law to outlaw them. That ban on coach houses, more formally known as Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs), was repealed in December 2020. The City of Chicago permits the construction of new coach houses, or ADUs, for the first time in decades. Rents for coach houses, granny flats, tiny houses, and in-law suites tend to be lower than the rents for principal homes or apartments on the property, making these apartments an excellent fit for renters searching for less expensive apartment rents. Coach houses for sale do hit the market on occasion. Still, the revised city law to allow new construction of Chicago coach houses and granny houses should equate to more property owners building their own ADUs to bring in some rental income or potentially house members of the extended family.