Help with rezoning residential duplex into commercial property

[Qais Attarwala]

I have a duplex in Rosewood, Columbia SC and I spoke with the City of Columbia zoning to ask if I can add an additional unit to the property. They said that my parcel of land can hold a max of 3 units so I can either extend the current property into a triplex or add a free-standing unit to the land. However, they told me that I have to rezone my property as commercial and that I have to comply with a bunch of different regulations like updated landscaping, parking, etc. Has anyone else gone through this process of rezoning and can provide me with some links/guidance on the process? 

Thank you BP community!

[Qais Attarwala]

Quote from @Max Ferguson:

Quote from @Qais Attarwala:

I have a duplex in Rosewood, Columbia SC and I spoke with the City of Columbia zoning to ask if I can add an additional unit to the property. They said that my parcel of land can hold a max of 3 units so I can either extend the current property into a triplex or add a free-standing unit to the land. However, they told me that I have to rezone my property as commercial and that I have to comply with a bunch of different regulations like updated landscaping, parking, etc. Has anyone else gone through this process of rezoning and can provide me with some links/guidance on the process? 

Thank you BP community!

 I have no guidance for you specific state, maybe you'll get lucky with someone on here but you may want to start posting in your local FB forums or head to the local meetups to find someone. 

My question is: 
Is it worth it to go through all that trouble? Will the 100's of thousands to input into the project provide a viable return or a cash out/equity push up refi for it to make sense? 

I was in a similar position without the rezone, I can put a third unit on my duplexes property, but after running buildout numbers it makes far more sense to use that capital towards just buying another duplex. You're situation could be far different, for me I am looking at higher construction costs than you have (most likely) and deals in the area I can put 20% down on as opposed to using the money for another unit. 

Let us know what you figure out! Sounds like a really cool project!

Thank you for your reply Max, I'll post on my local meetup group's FB page and see if I can get some more info. Ironically, the leader of the meetup told me to check with the county if I can add another unit on the property and I confirmed that I can but he probably wasn't expecting for me to have to rezone it as commercial.