Platted on August 26, 1947, with 322 parcels zoned R-90 at a median of 12,542 square feet, rather than the two-acre RE-2 pattern that governs most of Potomac.
Willerburn Acres does not belong to the Potomac most buyers picture. Sections 1 and 2 were recorded the same day, August 26, 1947, as plats 2014 and 2015, making it the oldest recorded subdivision on our Potomac list, and it is zoned R-90 rather than RE-2. Its median parcel is 12,542 square feet, roughly a seventh of the two-acre minimum that governs most of the area. It also carries a Bethesda assessment district code despite its 20854 Potomac address, which is a recurring source of confusion in tax and comparable-sales research.
Sections 1 and 2 both went on record on August 26, 1947, as plats 2014 and 2015, and further sections were recorded through February 26, 2002. Fifty-five years of recording under one subdivision name means the plat you need is the one for your section, not the founding one. It also means the assessment and mapping records for Willerburn Acres cover parcels created under several different sets of rules, which is worth knowing before you compare two lots that look identical on an aerial.
R-90 sets a minimum lot area of 9,000 square feet and a minimum lot width of 75 feet. Across 322 parcels the median is 12,542 square feet. That is a fundamentally different housing product from the RE-2 land a few minutes away: it prices differently, carries a different tax basis and supports a different kind of renovation. It also means the constraints that dominate elsewhere in Potomac — two-acre minimums, septic reserve fields, sewer category changes — are not the ones that apply here. Confirm the current R-90 standards with Montgomery Planning before designing to any figure.
Because lots run larger than the R-90 minimum, division comes up, and it is a live pattern rather than a theory: a two-lot administrative subdivision creating a flag lot was approved at 11712 Gainsborough Road in July 2023, with an 80-foot building-envelope separation applied under Section 50.4.3.C. A lot that looks divisible on paper still requires approval, and the separation, width, frontage and access standards govern whether a flag lot is achievable on a particular parcel. If a division is part of your reason for buying, take it to Montgomery Planning before the contract rather than after. As of August 2026.
The streets are named for painters — Goya, Mary Cassatt, Whistler, Titian, Van Gogh, Renoir — which makes the subdivision instantly identifiable on a map. The houses match that era of naming: 158 were built in the 1960s and 117 in the 1970s, with a median year built of 1969, frame first and brick second. Expect the maintenance profile of that vintage, and expect a meaningful share of the stock to have been renovated at least once. Original-condition houses on the larger lots are where redevelopment interest concentrates.
The subdivision lies entirely within the Cabin John Creek watershed, classified Use I-P, and it is served by public water and public sewer throughout — no wells and no septic systems. Stream buffer and stormwater review still applies to work near the creek under the county's environmental guidelines, so confirm any constraint on a specific parcel with Montgomery Planning. Schools are Beverly Farms Elementary School, Herbert Hoover Middle School and Winston Churchill High School; Montgomery County Public Schools revises boundaries periodically, so confirm the current assignment for an address before relying on it. As of August 2026.
Willerburn Acres sits within Potomac — that guide covers the zoning, permitting and site constraints that apply across the wider area.
Artur can confirm what applies to a specific address here — lot, zoning, association documents and school assignment — before you write an offer.
