Apartments Over the Hair Salon: New Hampshire Opens Commercial Zones to Housing

New Hampshire has opened its commercial districts to housing. Property owners can now build apartments on commercially zoned land, an opportunity that did not exist a year ago. The core law is HB 631, passed in 2025, which created RSA 674:79 and RSA 674:80. Two 2026 laws, HB 1010 and HB 1588, amended RSA 674:80. This post describes the statute in its final form, as it reads beginning September 13, 2026. 

What RSA 674:80 Requires Beginning September 13, 2026

Under RSA 674:80, a municipality shall allow multi-family dwelling units on commercially zoned land. The statute uses RSA 674:43, I to define the term, which reaches only structures containing more than two dwelling units. 

This housing is allowed as a matter of right. A municipality may impose frontage, setback, and height requirements, but those requirements may be no different from the requirements that apply to commercial development. It may enforce no other requirement unless the statute expressly authorizes it. Site plan review survives, as do applicable state fire, building, and other code requirements.

Infrastructure is the one substantive check. A planning board may require a traffic study and proof that the project can connect to public water and sewer, or supply its own where no public system exists. It may deny the project if the roads cannot carry the traffic, the layout does not ensure pedestrian safety, the water supply is inadequate or would impair an abutting well, or wastewater cannot be lawfully disposed of. But the applicant may cure a deficiency and proceed.

A municipality may still restrict residential development in zones that permit industrial and manufacturing uses, where impacts such as air, noise, dust, glare, vibration, odor, or transportation would be incompatible with residential use. 

An owner improperly denied, or saddled with requirements the statute forbids, may recover reasonable attorney’s fees after successfully suing to enforce these rights. 

How We Got Here

HB 631 (Chapter 201, Laws of 2025) enacted the requirement, effective July 1, 2026: municipalities shall allow multi-family residential development on commercially zoned land. The 2026 session then reshaped RSA 674:80 through two laws.  ‍

HB 1010 (Chapter 319) arrived as a repeal. Housing advocates swarmed it, and the House rewrote it into its opposite. As enacted, HB 1010 recast the core term as “multi-family dwelling units,” as defined in RSA 674:43, I; added the infrastructure-adequacy test and the first express grounds for denial; and folded dust, glare, and vibration into the industrial-zone carve-out. 

It set an effective time of July 1, 2026, at 12:01 a.m. - one minute after HB 631 - though the Governor did not sign it until July 15. So when HB 1010 became law, it purported to have taken effect two weeks earlier. (We will leave that Back to the Future plot twist for another day.) 

HB 1588 (Chapter 329) did the heavy lifting. It made multi-family housing on commercial land allowed as a matter of right and held municipalities to frontage, setback, and height requirements no different from those for commercial development, barring any other municipal requirement not expressly authorized in RSA 674:80, though state fire and building codes still apply.

HB 1588 deleted two earlier provisions: the power to require ground-floor retail and the adaptive-reuse waiver of setback, height, and frontage. Deleting that waiver left an orphan - RSA 674:79 still defines "adaptive reuse," but no provision in the new law (or any law, as best we can tell) now uses the term.

In their place, HB 1588 added a conversion right for pre-existing nonconforming structures and the attorney’s fee remedy. Its zoning provisions take effect September 13, 2026. The final law cleared the House by a 185-171 vote. 

Why This Matters

These laws mark a shift, though not a total one. An owner must still satisfy RSA 674:80 and, through site plan review, show the planning board a project meets the statute’s requirements. 

What changed is the starting point. For decades, an owner often needed a variance, special exception, or conditional use permit, triggering the unpredictable and sometimes exasperating and expensive local approval process.

Now the housing is allowed as a matter of right. A municipality risks paying the owner's attorney's fees if it denies a compliant project on grounds the statute does not permit.

Seen in context, HB 631 and its 2026 amendments are the Legislature’s effort to facilitate housing against decades of accumulated statutes and ordinances that micro-manage development, many advanced by the New Hampshire Municipal Association, the municipalities’ lobbying arm. 

Whether the better course is to keep layering targeted fixes or to clear away underlying regulation is the deeper question. The Legislature is looking into that option. In 2025 it created a commission to study the New Hampshire Zoning Enabling Act, with a final report due November 1, 2026. 

Key takeaway

Housing in a commercial zone is now the rule, not the exception. Owners of tired commercial parcels, empty storefronts, and vacant offices should take a fresh look. The entitlement they lacked a year ago may now exist as a matter of right under RSA 674:80. 

For assistance with planning and zoning matters, building permits, real estate and civil litigation, please contact Alfano Law at (603) 856-8411 or by filling out our Contact Form.  The firm offers free or low-cost initial consultations for most matters.