Off-Grid Living in Burlington County, New Jersey

Burlington County, New Jersey is a tricky place to research off-grid living because the county itself doesn't set most of the rules you'd care about. I want to be upfront about that structure before getting into specifics, because it changes where you need to focus your homework.

The county has no countywide zoning code. The Burlington County Planning Board reviews larger subdivisions and site plans, mostly those touching a county road or affecting county drainage, and does long-range planning, but ordinary lot-by-lot zoning, including what kind of dwelling you can put on your land, setbacks, and whether an RV or tiny home counts as a legal residence, is decided separately by each of the county's 40 municipalities. Some use eCode360 or Municode to host their ordinances, so your first move should be pulling up your specific town's zoning chapter, not a county document.

Building permits are also handled locally. Every municipality's Construction Office enforces the state's Uniform Construction Code, and the county's only role here is the Construction Board of Appeals, which hears appeals from municipal construction or fire officials' decisions since no town in the county runs its own appeals board.

Where the county does step in directly is environmental health. The Burlington County Health Department issues permits for individual septic systems (what the county calls individual subsurface sewage disposal systems), handles septic abandonment and compliance certificates, and also permits private wells, layering on top of the state's DEP well program and the Private Well Testing Act. If your place will rely on well and septic, plan on getting an approval letter from this county health department before your municipality will even review your building application, and that approval is also practically tied to getting a certificate of occupancy.

I couldn't find any official Burlington County or New Jersey page addressing greywater reuse or rainwater harvesting specifically, so I'm marking those unclear rather than guessing. My working assumption, not a confirmed rule, is that greywater gets folded into the same sewage disposal rules the county Health Department enforces, but you should ask them directly rather than rely on that assumption. Rainwater collection for ordinary residential use doesn't appear to trigger any binding county or state permit requirement, but again, that's an absence of evidence rather than a confirmed green light.

Bottom line: for zoning, dwelling type, and RV/tiny home questions, your town's zoning and construction offices are the real authority. For septic, well, and water supply questions, the Burlington County Health Department is your authority, working under state DEP and UCC frameworks. Don't assume a rule I couldn't confirm here means "no rule" locally, always call and check.