diff --git a/doc/manual/rl-next/infallible-build-dirs.md b/doc/manual/rl-next/infallible-build-dirs.md
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..563d4fcde
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/manual/rl-next/infallible-build-dirs.md
@@ -0,0 +1,25 @@
+---
+synopsis: "Fallback to safe temp dir when build-dir is unwritable"
+issues: [fj#876]
+cls: [3501]
+category: "Fixes"
+credits: ["raito", "horrors"]
+---
+
+Non-daemon builds started failing with a permission error after introducing the `build-dir` option:
+
+```
+$ nix build --store ~/scratch nixpkgs#hello --rebuild
+error: creating directory '/nix/var/nix/builds/nix-build-hello-2.12.2.drv-0': Permission denied
+```
+
+This happens because:
+
+1. These builds are not run via the daemon, which owns `/nix/var/nix/builds`.
+2. The user lacks permissions for that path.
+
+We considered making `build-dir` a store-level option and defaulting it to `<chroot-root>/nix/var/nix/builds` for chroot stores, but opted instead for a fallback: if the default fails, Nix now creates a safe build directory under `/tmp`.
+
+To avoid CVE-2025-52991, the fallback uses an extra path component between `/tmp` and the build dir.
+
+**Note**: this fallback clutters `/tmp` with build directories that are not cleaned up. To prevent this, explicitly set `build-dir` to a path managed by Lix, even for local workloads.
diff --git a/lix/libstore/build/local-derivation-goal.cc b/lix/libstore/build/local-derivation-goal.cc
index 6e8d9480f..1d1d59a31 100644
--- a/lix/libstore/build/local-derivation-goal.cc
+++ b/lix/libstore/build/local-derivation-goal.cc
@@ -483,17 +483,47 @@ try {
         });
     }
 
-    createDirs(settings.buildDir.get());
+    try {
+        auto buildDir = worker.buildDirOverride.value_or(settings.buildDir.get());
 
-    /* Create a temporary directory where the build will take
-       place. */
-    tmpDir = createTempDir(
-        settings.buildDir.get(),
-        "nix-build-" + std::string(drvPath.name()),
-        false,
-        false,
-        0700
-    );
+        createDirs(buildDir);
+
+        /* Create a temporary directory where the build will take
+           place. */
+        tmpDir =
+            createTempDir(buildDir, "nix-build-" + std::string(drvPath.name()), false, false, 0700);
+    } catch (SysError & e) {
+        /*
+         * Fallback to the global tmpdir and create a safe space there
+         * only if it's a permission error.
+         */
+        if (e.errNo != EACCES) {
+            throw;
+        }
+
+        auto globalTmp = defaultTempDir();
+        createDirs(globalTmp);
+#if __APPLE__
+        /* macOS filesystem namespacing does not exist, to avoid breaking builds, we need to weaken
+         * the mode bits on the top-level directory. This avoids issues like
+         * https://github.com/NixOS/nix/pull/11031. */
+        constexpr int toplevelDirMode = 0755;
+#else
+        constexpr int toplevelDirMode = 0700;
+#endif
+        auto nixBuildsTmp =
+            createTempDir(globalTmp, fmt("nix-builds-%s", geteuid()), false, false, toplevelDirMode);
+        warn(
+            "Failed to use the system-wide build directory '%s', falling back to a temporary "
+            "directory inside '%s'",
+            settings.buildDir.get(),
+            nixBuildsTmp
+        );
+        worker.buildDirOverride = nixBuildsTmp;
+        tmpDir = createTempDir(
+            nixBuildsTmp, "nix-build-" + std::string(drvPath.name()), false, false, 0700
+        );
+    }
     /* The TOCTOU between the previous mkdir call and this open call is unavoidable due to
      * POSIX semantics.*/
     tmpDirFd = AutoCloseFD{open(tmpDir.c_str(), O_RDONLY | O_NOFOLLOW | O_DIRECTORY)};
diff --git a/lix/libstore/build/worker.hh b/lix/libstore/build/worker.hh
index 7fc3d1fe9..d9dc36e34 100644
--- a/lix/libstore/build/worker.hh
+++ b/lix/libstore/build/worker.hh
@@ -195,6 +195,7 @@ public:
     Store & store;
     Store & evalStore;
     AsyncSemaphore substitutions, localBuilds;
+    std::optional<Path> buildDirOverride;
 
 private:
     kj::TaskSet children;
diff --git a/tests/functional/build.sh b/tests/functional/build.sh
index 58fba83aa..fc83f61f3 100644
--- a/tests/functional/build.sh
+++ b/tests/functional/build.sh
@@ -174,3 +174,8 @@ test "$(<<<"$out" grep -E '^error:' | wc -l)" = 3
 <<<"$out" grepQuiet -E "error: 2 dependencies of derivation '.*-x4\\.drv' failed to build"
 <<<"$out" grepQuiet -vE "hash mismatch in fixed-output derivation '.*-x3\\.drv'"
 <<<"$out" grepQuiet -vE "hash mismatch in fixed-output derivation '.*-x2\\.drv'"
+
+# Ensure when if the system build dir is inaccessible, we can still build things
+BUILD_DIR=$(mktemp -d)
+chmod 0000 "$BUILD_DIR"
+nix --build-dir "$BUILD_DIR" build -E 'with import ./config.nix; mkDerivation { name = "test"; buildCommand = "echo rawr > $out"; }' --impure --no-link