Hey All! I have a piece of land under contract. Although I see this land shape often (Long skinny entrance and expanding beyond and behind current houses), I have never had a chance to purchase until now. I figured with all of the combined experience, a few folks would have dealt with this before.
Anything to be concerned about? Should I lower my expectation on sales price compared to “normal” lots? Hopefully, I’m just overthinking, but any feedback is appreciated.
Thanks all!
Neal Tallman
@nealctallman I've worked with a number of properties shaped like this. I haven't had many issues with them... but any red flags in my mind would correlate to the neighbors, if they don't suddenly want a driveway paved through what they always thought of as "their property".
Of course, that doesn't materially affect anything (that little strip of land isn't their property, after all), but it's not unheard of for the neighbors to get a little crabby about things like this.
These are often referred to as flag pole properties and are quite common. They're often desirable for being the lots that reach the open space/tree lines behind the properties and the sense of isolation from the road. This one pictured as a double lot should be a winner.
@geoffrey, I agree. The house I grew up in was on a lot like this, which we always referred to as a flag pole lot, as well. Only I think it was even worse because a portion of the access was actually not owned by my parents but was a deeded easement, I believe. Anyway, when my family and I were shopping for a home a few years ago, the house/lot we purchased doesn't have the skinny access strip, exactly, but does have the similar greatly-increased front setback and "in the woods" feeling at the house, relative to most of the neighbors, which I've always found desirable. So I don't know if we're in the minority or not, but buyers like myself are definitely out there.
That said, I did personally reduce the amount of an offer I made on a vacant parcel earlier this year because it was a flag pole lot that remained skinny, throughout. Specifically, I think it was a 15 acre parcel that ran back from the road, and then tucked in behind and between several other lots, without ever widening out much at all. I had a potential buyer who was looking for land in the area for hunting, and even though the size of the lot would ordinarily have been good, the shape of it made it such that you couldn't safely shoot on it, and someone looking to build a house wouldn't have gotten much of that sense of privacy on this lot, either, because of the odd layout, so I factored all that into my offer, which the owner declined.
Thank you all for the input. This helped ease some of my worries about the property. In fact, Geoffrey even pointed out some positives that I'll have to throw into my copy when selling. As for the neighbors, I guess time will tell.
Again, much appreciated all!
