Off-Grid Living in Shelby County, Tennessee

I'll level with you up front: Shelby County, Tennessee is not the easy "no zoning, do what you want" rural county that a lot of off-grid seekers picture. Because it shares a Unified Development Code with the City of Memphis, and because it built its own Health Department water and septic programs decades ago, this is one of the more regulated counties I've researched in Tennessee. That's not a dealbreaker, it just means you plan around county-specific rules instead of assuming state minimums apply.

Zoning. Unincorporated Shelby County land falls under the Memphis and Shelby County Unified Development Code, run by the Division of Planning and Development. There's a Conservation Agriculture (CA) district that gets used for more rural-style rezoning, but any raw land you're eyeing still has to conform to its assigned district. Zoning changes and special-use requests go through the Land Use Control Board before heading to either Memphis City Council or the County Commission. Check the actual parcel's zoning before you buy anything with off-grid dreams attached.

Dwellings, tiny homes, RVs. I could not confirm a Shelby County-specific policy on tiny houses on wheels or long-term RV living. The state adopted Appendix Q of the IRC in 2018, but I found no county page saying whether Shelby County opted in, opted out, or has its own take. Call Construction Code Enforcement before you commit to a tiny home as a permanent residence here.

Building permits. Shelby County's Office of Construction Code Enforcement issues permits and requires contractors to be registered locally and licensed by the state. Depending on scope, they may want mechanical/plumbing/electrical drawings. This office covers unincorporated areas and some municipalities that don't run their own building department, so confirm coverage for your specific address.

Septic and composting toilets. The Shelby County Health Department requires a permit for constructing, altering, extending, or repairing any subsurface sewage system, administered under county regulations for these systems. I didn't find a documented composting-toilet exemption, so plan on meeting the state NSF-41 baseline standard and checking with the Health Department directly.

Greywater. No county-specific ordinance turned up in my research. This appears to fall back to state plumbing code baseline, but ask the Health Department's Water Quality Branch to be sure.

Rainwater harvesting. Nothing in county code restricts this that I could find, so it looks like the state's generally permissive stance carries through here.

Wells. This is where Shelby County stands apart: it runs its own well program and a Ground Water Quality Control Board, separate from a typical rural TN county. Any well work, drilling, repair, or abandonment, requires an application to the Health Department's Water Quality Branch, and a water production well applicant must show written proof the local utility can't serve the property. Construction has to follow the county's own well code.

Utilities. MLGW, the municipal utility owned by Memphis, dominates electric, gas, and water service here. Electric disconnection itself isn't restricted, but going without public water or sewer means routing through the county's septic and well permitting programs rather than a simple opt-out.

Bottom line: call before you buy, and call again before you build.