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Can you rent by the room in Fort Lauderdale, FL?

Restricted. Three unrelated people. As tight as Philadelphia, and the tightest in Florida.

Occupancy cap

THREE. ULDR sec. 47-35: "Family. One (1) or more persons living together and interrelated by bonds of consanguinity, marriage or legal adoption, or a group of persons up to three (3) in number who are not so interrelated, occupying the whole or part of a dwelling as a single housekeeping unit, supplied with a kitchen or facilities for doing their own cooking on the premises, and who share common living facilities."

Is it a permitted use

Three unrelated renters is the ceiling for an ordinary dwelling. A fourth makes it a Group Dwelling - "a building, or part thereof, in which several unrelated persons or families permanently reside, but in which individual cooking facilities are not provided" - which expressly covers rooming houses and is not permitted by right in single-family districts.

Registration or licensing

Broward County and the city both require a business tax receipt for rental activity; Fort Lauderdale also runs a Landlord Registration Program (Code ch. 9 art. XI) covering residential rentals. Group Dwelling needs its own approval.

State pre-emption

Florida has no statewide preemption. ★ BROWARD COUNTY CONTEXT (Sec. 39-4, read 2026-09-01): the county's own definition is 'any number of persons living together as a single housekeeping unit, whether legally related or not... but SHALL NOT INCLUDE PAYING GUESTS.' No cap and no relatedness test - but paying guests are expressly excluded, so letting rooms for money puts you outside the definition regardless of headcount. That governs UNINCORPORATED Broward, not the City of Fort Lauderdale, but it is the pattern to look for in Broward municipalities. Florida preempts local rent control (SB 102, 2023) and vacation-rental regulation (sec. 509.032(7)), but occupancy definitions are local and Fort Lauderdale's is strict.

What a room rents for in Fort Lauderdale

A shared room in Fort Lauderdale runs about $290/week across the 46 ZIP codes we cover here. Private-room rates, per-ZIP figures and the local enforcement record are on the analyzer.

How to read this

Renting a house by the room is usually governed by three things: how many unrelated adults may share one dwelling, whether the arrangement is a permitted use or a boarding house, and whether the state has pre-empted the local rule. This page summarises the ordinance and cites it. It is research, not legal advice — a local land-use attorney decides whether a specific property complies.

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