Land Buying Do's & Don'ts...

[buck12]

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*In 1965 my parents sold a small part of one of their lots to the state of Ohio for the I 77 right of way.
In 1989 when mom died I became the executor of their estate and discovered the County had given the state the entire lot, but had been charging my parents real estate tax on it .
For 24 years the county charged my parents taxes on property that the county had given to the state.
Needless to say there was no refuned of the un owed taxes .
The county officials here are some of the most inept people I've ever run across.
I just recently received a tax bill on a piece of property
that does not exist.
They have been trying to colect this for over 25 years.
Another time they billed me for a building that was on some one elses land instead of mine .
A few years back they screwed up on the tax records and I wound up having to pay for 5 years of back taxes as a penality.yet they were the ones who screwed up.

Inept county tax officials exist in other areas as well. I bought my house when the market was good yet our tax assessor placed a value on my house last year that I truly believe he pulled out of the air. I was told the purchase price had nothing to do with the assessed value. In truth the value has dropped yet I have no true recourse. Makes perfect sense!

 

[Skyco]

One other tidbit-
carefully check out what you may have to listen to.
I have 10 acres on a mountain in NC.
Unfortunately it is above and within earshot of I-26.
The unmuffled motorcycles, hoards of them in summer, and the big rigs with illegally removed mufflers using their jake brakes drive me nuts.
Law Enforcement will do NOTHING about it even though mufflers are required under state and federal law That surprises me since they are missing a heck of a revenue stream

 

[nickel plate]

When we first started looking for a retirement rural property several years ago, one criteria was that it should back up to a BLM property so we could have immediate access to hunting, fishing and the like. It didn't take me long to drop that notion after staying a week on a friend's 1100 acre ranch that recently an adjacent fence line private parcel was sold or traded to the BLM. The trespassings and illegal deer stands became rampant once the word got out about the new piece of public land.
How about C C & Rs? Any association dues? Private road maintainence dues?

 

[tlbuser]

i didn't notice anyone mentioning Transfer Development Rights (TDR's). If they are issued in your locality, make sure you have 100% ownership of those rights. Otherwise, you may have just bought a non-buildable lemon.

Oversimplified but close, TDR's are a type of Zoning Ordinance that allows owners of property zoned for low-density development or conservation use to sell development rights to other property owners. For example, two landowners, A and B, are each allowed to build ten homes on their property. Using TDRs, landowner A could sell his development rights to landowner B, allowing B to build twenty homes provided that A leaves his land undeveloped.

 

[ThrowinDirt]

Well fella's,

After further research, I'm please to find that: There are no restrictions, easements, utility problems, access issues, or privacy issues.

A few positives learn are that the neighbors are good people (only 3 families). The property is on a dead end street. It borders a super fertile bottom, with 500 acres of land locked government owned public land (locked by the 3 families & the proposed property). This gov land was bought up to conserve the wetlands in this bottom. The property & gov land have excellent deer, duck & turkey hunting (important to me).

Now for the negatives found. The price is at the upper level of what I am willing to spend. Also, the mineral rights are tied up for the next ten years. I was prepared for this though because every single family in the Parish in which I live has their minerals leased due to the haynesville shale gas field which was found 3 years ago. Its the largest natural gas discovery in this nation's history. Due to this, land is becoming harder & harder to find, because families are getting rediculous royalty checks & not needed to sell land. So I feel like I need to make it happen now or the opportunity might not arise for a long, long time.

Thanks for all the help fella's, JY.

 

[MarkV]

Sounds like most things are right and land locked government land sounds like a bonus. When my wife and I found our land we were not even looking at the time. It met close to 90% of what we wanted eventually so we bought. Like you said, might not get the chance again for a long time if ever.

MarkV

 

[jimgerken]

Throwin dirt: Please do yourself a favor and see the documentary "Gasland" before you buy that particular parcel.
Taxes: In my area, the real estate taxes are based on market value. Market value is established very clearly when a property sells to a new owner. Example: The property I own had a tax of $435 a year before I bought it. The year after I bought it, the tax went to $1250 (and has gone up every year since). When I objected, they said I established the market value when I bought it. So you might as well tell the assesor what you are planning on paying for the land now, and ask him what the taxes will be. He has access to this info anyway, you might as well know up-front.

 

[brin]

" A few positives learn are that the neighbors are good people (only 3 families) "

I would suggest that a neigbors opinion about someone you are buying land from is not to be relied on. Do a search right here on TBN and you will see that there are quite a few folks with bad neighbors ....so if you were going to buy their land and talked to the bad neigbors they had and believed the bad neighbor when they said the seller was a bad person ..you would indeed be in a mess.

Keep in mind also that neighbors change...I remember years ago my wife wanted to buy a house beciase she had met the two next door neighbor ladies and liked them..It was a new house under constuction in an established subdivision and I explained to my wife the huse was a good deal and we would buy it but not to count on the neighbors going with the deal and sure enough within 2 yrs. of us moving in ...one neighbor couple divorced and the other moved to Cocta Rica...new neighbors and life went on...Just do your own due dilligence and take what neighbors say with a grain of salt...but rather pay attention to what you see and hear and how you like the property. There is no perfect land !

 

[piller]

Now for the negatives found. The price is at the upper level of what I am willing to spend. Also, the mineral rights are tied up for the next ten years.

We had a sales contract to purchase a farm which stated that we would have all mineral rights to the property. At closing I read the newly prepared deed and found that one company owned coal rights, a second company owned gas rights, and a third company owned oil rights. Finally, there was a restriction on timber rights also. This was all a complete surprise!

We did not sign the closing documents and said these issues needed to be resolved to our satisfaction. It took about 3 weeks and we obtained releases from all parties regarding mineral rights and the timber restriction removed. After everything was straightened out we did in fact close on the property and have had no problems at all. We did elect to purchase title insurance for the property.

I suggest you use a good real estate attorney to look after your interests.

 

[SBB]

Sounds like a real nice piece of land. There's nothing better than owning your land! I suggest you re-read the entire thread with a piece of paper and make notes as you go. There is a ton of good advice here. The checklist you make could be worth a lot of money!

Two things I'd stress: 1) You read the title report and make sure you understand everything on it. Things on your title may really impact how you can use your property. Don't rely on your lawyer's review of the title if you use a lawyer (and as a lawyer I'd recommend it). As an example, your lawyer may not think a particular easement is any big deal and not mention it to you, but it might really impact how you want to use the property. The title insurance company will get a copy of every document recorded on the title and it shouldn't cost much, if anything, for the copies, but they don't like to go to the trouble and you've got to ask for the docs. Read each document and understand how it impacts your parcel. Some of the things on the title may not be relevent anymore, but the title insurance company will try to exclude them from your insurance coverage. If that happens, don't be afraid to push back. It always surprises me how few people actually review the chain of title on a piece of property. If you're going to spend a lot of money on something, you should really understand what you're buying and how you might be limited in its use.

I've got copies of everything on the title of my land right back to the original patent the US government gave the railroad. In your neck of the woods, you may have a chain of title back to the King of France (how cool would that be?).

Beware of unrecorded easements. If there are trails on the property, one of your neighbors may have an unrecorded easement - which, under the right set of facts - is just as enforceable as a recorded easement.

2) It sounds as though you might have water on your property. Even if its just a seasonal creek, make sure you know what the set backs are in your area. Remember, the set backs are from the high water mark, not from where the water happens to be right now (at least that's the law up here).

Good luck!