Los Gatos HOA Guide: Local Rules for Boards and Owners

Los Gatos has licensed short-term rentals since March 21, 2019, when the ordinance the Town Council approved on February 19, 2019 took effect. Before that, the town says, its zoning code was silent on them and they were not permitted. A rental of fewer than 30 nights now needs a short-term rental license from the Planning Division and a town business license, renewed every calendar year. The main limits, from the town’s own questions and answers:

• Owner’s primary residence only. The host must be the owner of record and live at the property at least nine months of the year.
• Hosted rentals are capped at 180 days a year and un-hosted rentals at 30 days a year.
• One short-term rental per parcel and one per owner. Licenses townwide are capped at 5% of the town’s housing stock, with a waiting list after that.
• Not allowed in apartment buildings, senior housing, Below Market Price units or accessory dwelling units approved after February 6, 2018.
• Overnight occupancy is limited to two adults per bedroom plus one more person per unit. Weddings and other commercial or assembly uses are not allowed.
• Guests must park on-site where street parking is prohibited. In permit parking areas they are limited to the two guest passes each property can buy from the Police Department.
• A local representative must be reachable at all hours, be within 30 minutes’ travel of the property and be able to respond to a complaint within 60 minutes.

One step is aimed squarely at associations. The town’s answer to whether a home in an HOA can be rented short-term is yes, but the applicant must submit a letter of approval from the homeowner association, and the application form lists that letter among the required documents. In practice the board holds a veto over the license. Decide now who answers these requests, what your CC&Rs say and how fast you will reply, so that the answer is consistent from one owner to the next.

The host must also give guests a copy of the town’s noise, smoking and short-term rental ordinances and the trash collection schedule, and must file a transient occupancy tax form every quarter even when no tax is due. A license is revoked automatically after three confirmed violations in twelve months, and a revocation lasts five years. A town license does not override your CC&Rs. California Civil Code section 4741 limits how far an association can restrict rentals generally, but it does not stop an association from prohibiting rentals of 30 days or less.

Gasoline leaf blowers have been banned in Los Gatos since July 1, 2014. Town Code section 16.20.060 prohibits them in every residential, commercial and industrial zone and in public spaces. Electric blowers are allowed only if they are no louder than 65 decibels measured 50 feet away. For a board with a landscape contract, this is the town rule most likely to produce a letter addressed to the association.

• Hours: the town’s page allows leaf blowers, lawn mowers, edge trimmers and hedge trimmers from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekends.
• The same page says leaf blower use is prohibited on Sundays and holidays, so the safe weekend schedule for blowers is Saturday only.
• Enforcement: an officer first tells the operator about the ban. A warning letter then goes to the property owner or property management company and to the gardening company. Continued violations can bring a citation to the property owner, the gardener or both.
• Gardeners working in town must hold a valid town business license.

Construction has its own hours. The Building Division lists construction work hours as 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays, with no work on Sundays or holidays. Write both sets of hours and the gas blower ban into your landscape and construction contracts, and ask each vendor for its town business license. Your own rules can set shorter hours.

The town’s tree protection rules are in Chapter 29 of the Town Code and they reach deep into private property. A permit from Parks and Public Works is needed to remove a protected tree, and size is measured as trunk diameter four and a half feet above natural grade, with the trunks of a multi-trunk tree added together. The town’s application lists these thresholds:

The last row is the one associations miss. Trees on the landscape plan the town approved with your subdivision are protected whatever their size, so do not assume a common-area tree is too small to need a permit. A permit is also needed to prune more than 25% of a protected tree within three years, and to cut any branch or root over four inches in diameter on a heritage tree or a large protected tree. Large protected means any tree of 48 inches or more, or an oak, California buckeye or Pacific madrone of 24 inches or more.

• Fees when we checked: $256 for the first tree and $128 for each additional tree on the same application. The town lists a $337 administrative fee for illegal removal, on top of possible fines and civil action.
• A permit expires 90 days after it is issued, and replacement trees must be in the ground by then.
• Replacement is set by the canopy of the tree removed, from two 24-inch box trees for a canopy of 10 feet or less up to ten for a canopy over 55 feet. Where the Town Arborist agrees trees cannot be planted on site, the in-lieu fee is $250 for each 24-inch box tree and $500 for each 36-inch box tree.
• Exempt from the permit: fruit and nut trees under 18 inches, and a short list of species such as blue gum eucalyptus, tree of heaven, privet and most palms under 24 inches.
• A dangerous tree may be removed without a permit only where there is imminent danger. The town’s form says to notify the town and get approval before acting, then send photos and a description within 72 hours.

Since 2020 the Town Code has also exempted trees removed or maintained for defensible space from the tree protection rules, with some categories of protected tree left out of the exemption. Ask Parks and Public Works at (408) 399-5771 which case your tree falls in before your vendor starts.

Fire protection in Los Gatos comes from the Santa Clara County Fire Department, not a town fire department, and wildfire is the hazard the town plans around. Its wildfire page describes three defensible space zones around a structure: no flammable materials within 5 feet, cleared dry vegetation and spaced plants from 5 to 30 feet, and thinned brush, trimmed trees and no ladder fuels from 30 to 100 feet.

The town amended its code in January 2020. According to its wildfire page, the changes were:

• A 5-foot nonflammable zone is required around new structures in the wildland urban interface (Chapter 9).
• Defensible space can be required beyond a property line in certain circumstances (Chapter 9). For an association that owns slopes or open space behind homes, this is the provision to ask about.
• Weed clearance along roadways went from 5 feet to 10 feet (Chapter 11).
• Trees removed or maintained for defensible space are exempt from the tree protection rules (Chapter 29).

Two inspection programs can reach your parcels. A 2021 town staff report describes a Hazardous Brush Abatement Program managed by County Fire for properties in the wildland urban interface: letters in March, inspections from April 1, a Town Council hearing and, if the owner does not act, contractor work charged to the property tax bill. Separately, Los Gatos takes part in the Santa Clara County Weed Abatement Program. Its inspection window for Los Gatos opens April 15 and parcels must stay in compliance through October 31. For 2026 the county lists a $296 initial inspection fee for each parcel in the program, and far higher charges if its contractor has to do the work. A parcel leaves the program after three consecutive years of compliance.

We could not read street-level detail from the adopted fire hazard map, so we do not say which neighborhoods are in which zone. Look up your addresses on the State Fire Marshal’s map. County Fire offers a free defensible space inspection, and the Santa Clara County FireSafe Council runs a community chipping program for residents in or near the wildland urban interface. Both are worth booking before the board prices any work.

In the areas on the town’s Hillside Area Map, the Hillside Development Standards and Guidelines apply on top of the zoning code. They are town rules, so they apply alongside your architectural guidelines, and an approval from your committee does not replace town review. In that document the words shall and prohibited mark a mandatory standard and should marks a guideline. Standards a design committee will meet most often:

• Height: 25 feet for hillside homes, and no more than 18 feet above existing grade for ridgeline and visible homes. Three-story elevations are prohibited.
• Size: allowable floor area falls as the lot gets steeper and tops out at 6,000 square feet unless the Planning Commission grants an exception.
• Color: exterior materials must average a light reflectivity value of 30 or less, roofs are calculated separately to the same limit, and roofs must be a dark earth tone.
• Fire: Class A roofing, noncombustible gutters and downspouts and enclosed under-deck areas are standards, not suggestions.
• Pools and sport courts are prohibited on slopes steeper than 30%. Retaining walls are guided to 5 feet, with terraces for anything taller.

Fences are where hillside associations and the town most often overlap. The town’s fence handout, updated in June 2024, sets these rules for the hillside area:

• Maximum height of 6 feet for fences, walls, gates and hedges.
• On properties of one acre or more, perimeter fencing must be wildlife-friendly: no more than 42 inches high, with at least 18 inches between the bottom rail and the ground.
• Within 20 feet of a property line next to a street, fences must be open view, meaning no more than 20% solid.
• Solid fences, double fencing and buck and rail fences are prohibited. Chain link and wire mesh must have a green, brown or black finish and a wood frame.
• Vehicle gates must sit at least 18 feet back from the edge of the street, and further where a gate serves more than one house.

Townwide, fences may be 6 feet with one more foot of lattice, and 3 feet in corner sight triangles and driveway view areas. Fences that existed on September 6, 2019 are exempt and may be maintained or replaced in kind. If your design guidelines call for a solid perimeter wall or a fence style the hillside rules prohibit, the town rule wins for new work.

Los Gatos does not run a water utility. The town lists San Jose Water, a private company regulated by the California Public Utilities Commission, as its water provider, so watering rules come from the company’s tariff and from Valley Water, the county’s wholesale water agency, not from the Town Code.

Valley Water’s board adopted a permanent ordinance on June 13, 2023 that applies even when there is no drought. Its examples of prohibited water waste:

• Running sprinklers between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m.
• Watering outdoors within 48 hours of measurable rain.
• Washing sidewalks, driveways and similar hard surfaces, except power washing for health and safety.

San Jose Water’s own shortage plan, Rule 14.1, works in stages. Its first stage bars watering between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m., limits sprinkler systems to 15 minutes per station per day and prohibits runoff, with exceptions for drip irrigation and low-flow sprinklers. Later stages add watering days by address: three days a week at stage 2, two at stage 3 and one at stage 4. When we checked, the company’s water use restrictions page still displayed the stage 3 schedule, Monday and Thursday for odd and unnumbered addresses and Tuesday and Friday for even ones, without a date, while its conservation page named no stage at all. Call San Jose Water at (408) 279-7900 and ask which stage is in effect before your landscaper programs the controllers, and get the answer in writing. The company also offers a free outdoor water efficiency visit through its CATCH program.

Two points matter for the budget. First, Valley Water’s Landscape Rebate Program pays a base rate of $2 per square foot to convert high-water-use lawn, and $1 per square foot for its lawn-to-mulch option on commercial, institutional and multifamily properties of five or more units. The cap for commercial sites and multifamily sites of five or more units is $100,000, against $3,000 for a single home, and Valley Water says funding lasts until June 30, 2027 or until it runs out. You must apply, pass a pre-inspection and receive a written Notice to Proceed before any work starts. Ask Valley Water which category your common-area account falls in. Second, a state law passed in 2023 (AB 1572) will bar the use of drinking water on nonfunctional turf in HOA common areas starting January 1, 2029. A board with decorative lawn can use the rebates to pay for part of a conversion it will have to make anyway.

On owners’ lots, Civil Code section 4735 prevents an association from banning low-water plants or artificial turf as a replacement for lawn.

The town’s ADU rules are in Division 7 of Chapter 29 of the Town Code, and the Planning Division summarizes them in a brochure last updated in April 2024. An ADU may be up to 1,200 square feet. Most ground-floor units are capped at 16 feet in height, with 4-foot side and rear setbacks. A single-family lot may have one ADU plus one junior ADU of up to 500 square feet inside the walls of the house. A junior ADU requires the owner to live on the property and a recorded deed restriction. An ADU does not.

ADUs approved after February 6, 2018 cannot be used as short-term rentals. The brochure also allows ADUs on multifamily lots: conversions of non-livable space such as storage rooms and garages, up to 25% of the existing homes, plus two detached units. State law on multifamily ADUs has changed more than once, so confirm the current numbers with Planning at (408) 354-6874. In a condominium the land and the building shell are usually common area, so nothing of the kind happens without the association.

For boards, the state rule matters more than the town one. Civil Code section 4751 voids CC&R provisions that prohibit or unreasonably restrict an ADU or junior ADU on a lot zoned for single-family use. An association can still apply reasonable restrictions through its architectural review process.

The town’s on-street parking page lists three Town Code rules for public streets, and state law adds a fourth:

The town’s pages do not set out a separate time limit for RVs, boats or trailers, so we do not describe one. Some neighborhoods are residential permit parking districts with their own signs and overnight limits, and permits are issued online.

Inside your gates the town does very little. Its parking questions page says vehicles parked on private property are the property owner’s responsibility, and that parking enforcement officers can issue citations on private property only for fire lane and accessible stall violations. Everything else on association-owned streets is governed by your own rules and by state towing law. Report abandoned vehicles on public streets to the town’s 24-hour hotline at (408) 399-5716.

The town’s smoking regulations, in Town Code section 18.60.010, took effect on June 26, 2016. The town’s summary lists the places where smoking is prohibited, and one of them is all indoor and outdoor multi-family housing units and spaces of two or more units. Parks, trails, commercial zones and shopping center parking lots are on the same list.

The summary does not spell out how the rule treats owner-occupied condominiums and townhomes, private balconies or designated smoking areas, and we could not read the full ordinance text, so we do not describe those details here. The town’s page directs questions to the Town Attorney’s office at (408) 354-6818. Ask before you tell owners what is and is not allowed, then make sure your own rules do not promise more than the town permits. Short-term rental hosts must hand guests a copy of the smoking ordinance.

Los Gatos has a Rental Dispute Resolution Program, run for the town by a nonprofit, Project Sentinel. It binds the owner as landlord, not the association, but a board that deals with tenants should know it exists:

• Free counseling and phone conciliation for rental properties of two or more units, and mediation and arbitration for properties of three or more.
• Rent limits apply to properties of three or more units and protect current tenants only. A tenant can receive one increase a year unless they agree otherwise.
• An annual increase of 5%, or 70% of the applicable consumer price index, is presumed valid. A larger one must be justified under the program’s cost formulas if tenants challenge it. After two years with no increase, 10% is allowed.
• A rent increase notice must tell tenants about the program. A notice that leaves out the program’s name or correct phone number is invalid.
• A termination notice issued within six months after a tenant uses the program is presumed retaliatory.

The town’s published answers do not say how an individually owned condominium inside a larger building is counted, so an owner who rents out a unit should ask the program at (408) 402-0307. The town says it does not regulate no-fault evictions itself. If the association is pressing an owner to remove a tenant over rule violations, the owner’s attorney will need to work within state law and this program.

The town’s fence rules bar any fence, wall or gate within 20 feet of a riparian corridor, which matters to associations with creek-side common area. Beyond that, the Hazards and Safety Element of the town’s 2040 General Plan is the best public summary of what the ground can do here:

• Flooding of most concern comes from heavy rain causing local flooding or flash floods. The element maps FEMA flood zones in a figure and does not list streets.
• Lenihan Dam at Lexington Reservoir is described as the largest concern for dam inundation. The element says a failure could affect more than 3,000 people and damage more than 1,000 structures.
• Landslides are a risk in most of the southern and eastern parts of town, and liquefaction risk is centered along Highway 17.
• New development in a mapped hazard zone requires a geotechnical report.

None of this is a duty on the board by itself. It is a reason to know whether your common-area buildings, slopes and retaining walls sit in a mapped flood, landslide or inundation area, and to make sure the reserve study and the insurance program reflect it.