What You Can Build Without a Permit in Cochise County

Cochise County publishes a list of single-family residential projects that do not need a building permit. It is genuinely useful, and it is also narrower than people remember it being — because most of the entries carry a condition, and the conditions are where the trouble is.

Start with the threshold everything sits on. Per state law, building permits are required for new structures or renovations of existing structures that meet or exceed $1,000 in value. Below that, and within the exemption list, you are clear. Above it and outside the list, you are not.

The entries that matter most on rural land

The full list covers building, electrical, gas, mechanical, plumbing and a catch-all "other". These are the ones that come up on parcels out here:

Project	The limit
Storage shed	≤200 sq ft, one storey, detached, no utilities
Water tank on grade	Capacity ≤5,000 gallons and height-to-width ratio no more than 2:1
Deck	Under 30 inches above the lowest grade within 5 feet of the deck edge
Retaining wall	Up to 4 feet in height
Fence — wood, block or wire	Up to 7 feet high, but see the informational permit trap below
Satellite dish / residential antenna	Exempt
Concrete walkways and patio slabs	Exempt, provided not in county right-of-way
Prefabricated pool	Under 24 in deep, ≤5,000 gallons, entirely above ground
Re-roof, re-side, replace windows or doors	Exempt where there are no structural changes

The water tank entry is the one worth writing down if you are on hauled water. Five thousand gallons is a serious tank, and the 2:1 ratio quietly rules out the tall narrow ones — a tank twice as tall as it is wide is at the limit, and anything more slender than that is outside the exemption regardless of capacity. Our hauled water versus drilling piece covers the storage sizing side.

The fence trap

Fences up to seven feet are exempt from a building permit — and then the county adds a list of situations where an informational permit is required anyway. A fence needs one if any of these apply:

• it is on a corner lot and greater than 3 feet in height;
• it is within a designated FEMA Flood Hazard Area;
• it is within a designated wash; or
• it is in a platted subdivision.

Two of those four are about water, which is not a coincidence. Fencing is one of the activities that can trigger a floodplain use permit in its own right — building, grading, filling, walls and fencing are all named. So a fence line crossing a wash is a fence line with paperwork, even though a fence is nominally permit-exempt.

Worth reading alongside the fencing question generally, because in open range the fence you actually need is a statutory one — posts no more than 30 feet apart, four wires, top wire at 50 inches — and that specification has nothing to do with whether a permit is required.

Exempt from a permit is not exempt from the rules

This is the distinction the whole page turns on, and the county states it plainly: regardless of whether your project requires a building permit, it must still be constructed in conformance with the regulations of the jurisdiction and all applicable state laws.

Concretely, a permit exemption does not exempt you from:

• Zoning setbacks — measured from the closest point on the property line or the edge of road travelway, whichever is closer.
• Floodplain rules, which the exemption page itself flags: depending on location, a floodplain permit may still be required.
• The watercourse erosion setback, 50 to 300 feet from the primary bank depending on peak flow, which applies to structures whether or not you are in mapped floodplain.
• Septic protection. Nothing about a permit exemption makes it acceptable to put a shed or a slab on the reserve area your evaluator identified — see the septic guide.

And one scope limit that catches people running anything commercial: the exemption list is for single-family residential projects. A permit is required regardless of the dollar value of the improvement when building code requirements apply for non-residential uses.

How this fits the build sequence

The exemptions are most useful in the gap between buying and building, when you want somewhere to put tools and a tank without starting the permit clock. A 200 square foot unpowered shed and a 5,000 gallon tank on grade will cover a surprising amount of that.

What they will not do is let you live there. Camping on vacant land is not permitted, and an RV needs an existing principal use or an active build — covered in living in an RV while you build. And if you are heading for the owner-builder route, none of these exemptions change the eligibility rules there.

What we could not confirm

• We could not confirm what an informational permit costs, how long it takes, or exactly what it involves beyond being required in the four fence situations listed.
• We could not confirm how "no utilities" is assessed for the shed exemption — whether a solar panel and a battery on the shed counts, for instance. Ask before you wire it.
• We could not confirm whether the 200 square foot shed limit is measured to the exterior wall or the interior floor area, which matters at the margin.
• We could not confirm how the county treats several exempt sheds on one parcel, or whether they are considered cumulatively.
• We could not confirm the current fee schedule for anything on this page. The county publishes a Development Services fee schedule and interactive calculators.
• The exemption list is described by the county as typical examples rather than an exhaustive statement. If your project is not obviously on it, that is a phone call rather than an assumption.

The short version

State law sets the threshold at $1,000 in value, and Cochise County publishes a list of single-family residential projects that are exempt below and around it. The useful ones out here are a detached storage shed at 200 square feet or less with no utilities, a water tank on grade up to 5,000 gallons with a height-to-width ratio no steeper than 2:1, a deck under 30 inches, a retaining wall up to 4 feet, and fences up to 7 feet. That last one carries a catch: an informational permit is still required on a corner lot above 3 feet, in a FEMA flood hazard area, in a designated wash, or in a platted subdivision. And exempt from a permit never means exempt from the rules — setbacks, floodplain, the watercourse erosion setback and your septic reserve area all still apply. The shed exemption dies the moment you run a wire to it.

Sulfur Springs Land Management does the pads, access and drainage that sit underneath all of this, permitted or not.