Buying A Home With Land: What To Look For
Posted on: 27 February 2017
A home with land is always a grand adventure in the making. Even a home that is a fixer upper can be a great deal if it comes on acreage that is spacious and contains a lot of use for your potential ownership. Before you buy a house with land on it, look for a few key things that can affect you once you buy.
Actual property lines
You want to make sure the home is listed with its actual property lines. Sometimes real estate agents or banks list homes based on the property lines given by current homeowners rather than what is actually listed with city ordinances. A home may share a well with a neighboring property or be fenced in on land that actually doesn't belong to the property. Just as likely is a home that has boundary lines that are actually larger than what the previous owner thought. You can go to your local city office to get coordinates on any property you are looking at so you know how much land (and where it is) you are actually buying.
Outbuildings
Homes on land often come with outbuildings such as shops, barns, or even animal shelters or corrals. You want to look at all outbuildings to make sure they are sound, and if a shop comes with electricity and a bathroom, you want to make sure it is on its own working septic system. If the previous owner rarely or never used the buildings that come with the home, you may have to fix them up or update them to make them useful to you, which is a cost you can discuss with your realtor.
Actual home value
In many cases houses with land are priced for the value of the land, not the home itself. Find out what acreage with a well and septic cost in your area and deduct that cost from the property's asking price. Then get your own appraisal on just the home to see if its listed value matches what it's actual current worth is. You may find that the home is being placed at a much higher value than it is actually worth, disguised in the large lot of land it comes with. This can give you more knowledge when it comes to offering a buying price to the realtor that is fair market in its amount and allow you to negotiate more realistic prices with the seller.
For more information, contact local professionals like Seaboard Real Estate & Financial Services.
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