- As home prices skyrocket
across the United States, more and more people
are turning to the idea of buying themselves their
own lot or a piece of dirt, is what I always call it. I've seen lots of people
make lots of mistakes when buying their piece of land, and today I'm gonna be sharing with you some common mistakes and some things you need to look out for before you sign on the dotted line. (bluesy music) Of course, if you're considering
to buying a piece of land the number one thing is
to find a good location. So with that location, how
close is it to hospitals? How close is it to shopping? Are those things important to you? How long do you plan on living
on this piece of property, or keeping this piece of property so that way in the future
if you decide to sell it, well, how sellable is
this piece of property? In order to find all those things out, you can have a nice long conversation with a real estate agent, a local real estate agent in the area, and they can pull up comparables
on how much land has sold within the last six months,
even the last six years. So that way you can see how well land actually sells in the area. Because if you don't plan
on holding onto it forever, you'll wanna make sure that you're gonna be able
to sell it in the future. On my channel, I talk
about alternative housing, and manufactured homes, and tiny homes, and all sorts of different types of homes that people genuinely want to
build and put on their land. One thing that happens
more often than not, is that they buy
themselves a piece of land and then they find out after the fact, after they've purchased it, that they don't allow for those types of dwellings on the property. So when you're looking through the MLS or working with a real estate agent, make sure you make it clear to them that's what you intend on doing
with the piece of property. If you don't know what the MLS is, it's the Multiple Listing Service. And they can filter out
the pieces of property that will work for what you want to do and put build on that property. Whether it be a barndominium, a tiny home, a modular home, manufactured home. So that way you're ahead of the game and not wasting your time looking at a bunch of listings that won't even fit your needs. (bluesy music) When you're buying a piece of land the other thing you're
gonna want to really look at is if the piece of land has utilities already brought to the property. This could save you thousands
and thousands of dollars, so you wanna make sure that that property has that ahead of time. So now you know that there's utilities that are gonna be able to go
out to your property, yay. But what if you were thinking about going totally off the grid? Like you're not even gonna have
a well out to your property 'cause you're gonna do some
kind of composting toilet, and you're planning on doing solar power. Here's the problem with that. You're going to definitely have to check with the County officials
if they allow that. I know many areas that
say you must be attached to some kind of utilities. I know it's something that
people are doing more and more, but if you don't have approval you can cause yourself a big
headache with local officials. If you're trying to get off the grid, that's the last thing you want to happen is them have a big town meeting because you're not attached to any of the utilities in the area and you have a composting toilet. I know it sounds like
a really great dream, but you could be just
dreaming if you bought a piece of property and
they don't allow for this, it's a big giant expense. Another aspect of buying
a piece of property is a lot of people don't think
about, is the mineral rights. Now here in Louisiana,
on the state contract it will say the mineral
rights conveyed to the buyer. And then they'll give you like
a certain kinda percentage you can put that the seller keeps and then the buyer keeps. Most people don't know is a lot of times the land developer originally
already owns those rights. We have to wait a period
of time before the buyer actually gets full rights
to the mineral rights, so that could take up to 10 years. Why would you want it, and why wouldn't you want it? Well, here's the most extreme case. Say you were walking through your yard and on your property and ya stepped on it, remember in "The Beverly Hillbillies". ♪ He was shootin at some food ♪ ♪ And up through the ground
come a bubblin' crude ♪ - And the oil just starts
spurting out on their property. Well, if you didn't own the mineral rights for that piece of property,
that oil that you struck, it wouldn't go to you, it would go to the people that already had the mineral rights. So that is something you may
wanna concern yourself with, so that way you keep the
mineral rights for yourself. 'Cause who knows, it would be great to strike
a little liquid gold. Covenants and HOAs. Now every single piece of property has some kind of rules to it. Whether it's through the County, or through even the State. Like you can't have
cattle on the property, you're definitely gonna
wanna check those rules out. But you're also gonna wanna
check to see if there's an HOA. You can be in the middle of a desert and think there's no way
there's an HOA out here, but I assure you you need to dig that up. Because I just got a letter from somebody that said that they bought a piece of land and then all of a sudden
he got a letter in the mail saying that he needed to
clear out the property because the HOA had stated that
it needed to be cleared up. No matter how old the HOA is
and how old the rules are, they still can be enforced. You can usually get a copy of
that from the selling agent. If they don't happen to have a copy and the seller doesn't have a copy, I guarantee the title company
will be able to dig up a copy of the HOA covenants. Here in Louisiana we have
all sorts of wetlands and low lying areas. When you're buying a piece of property you're gonna wanna check
it in all weather types. Whenever you put in that first offer to buy a piece of property, I want you to check that piece
of property after it rains, on a sunny day, on a
cloudy day, on a snowy day, check that piece of property
to see where it holds water. Now you're also gonna wanna get a wetlands determination certificate. And that will let you know how much of the property itself is usable property, and that you can actually build on. I'm seeing it more often
than not, somebody says, "Oh I bought four acres of
land for a great price." And I'm like, "How much of it is usable?" And they're like, "Well only 10%." Well, you really only bought 10%, and the rest of it is
just for you to look at. If that's something that's
fine by you, that's fine. But just know that sometimes
when you're buying four acres, not all four acres is usable. Do want you to know that not
all dirt is created equal. You would think it's dirt,
and it comes from the ground, and it's naturally made. But no, you're gonna wanna get a soil sample of your dirt. You're gonna be able to find something that's able to do that
soil compaction test to make sure that it's a good dirt. You don't want bad dirt for your new home, and then your foundation starts cracking. All these things are gonna take time for you to have your inspections done, so make sure you allow for a
long time for your inspections. Typical house is about,
10 day inspection period, but with a piece of land you're gonna wanna extend
that out even longer. So that way you can have
all of your inspections done with your soil samples,
your wetlands determination. Hopefully, in the best case scenario the seller already has
that to provide to you. But not all soil is perfect
for building a house so you wanna make sure
that the piece of land that you're buying is gonna be
worth you putting a house on, because you might just
have a piece of land that's worth nothing because
you can't build a house on it. Now, when you're looking for land there's one thing you may
wanna look at as well, is the fact that if it's
considered agricultural land. If you're planning on holding
onto this piece of property for quite some time
before you build on it, and it is considered
agricultural land as well, you can actually rent out that land for people to allow their cows and other livestock to
graze on your property. Not only does that help the farmers, it gives you a little side business, and it gives you a tax credit. So just think of that if you're thinking about buying a big piece of land, and has agricultural under it. (bluesy music) When you're looking at property, it should come with some kind of plat map, or some kind of outline of
where that property line is all the way around. With that, you're also gonna wanna know from the listing agent, how far does the property
allow for you to set back? So if the line is here, how
many feet does your house or structure need to be set
back from the property line? And that also goes for the size as well. They should have that information, and if they don't they should
be able to look that up in County records or
with your title company that you're gonna be using
to close the property. So you've been scanning through Zillow and you find yourself a piece of property that is just absolutely perfect, but it's zoned commercial and you wanna build a house on it. Well, you're not gonna be able to do that. Your real estate agent
will be able to tell you if it is zoned residential. If you're unsure you can always
check with County records. With that being said, there is one zoning that I absolutely love, is mixed use, because you can actually have
a property that you live on, and a property that you work on, but you have to find out what their total requirements
are for mixed use, but that's one of my favorites. Here's another one that
gets really tricky, and it happens a lot here in Louisiana. I'm sure it happens throughout
the United States as well, is the easements. So that's the way that
people get to a property, or is there any easements
that allow people to go through your property that
you're planning on purchasing? Is there some kind of dirt road that everybody has access to? These are important
things you need to know before you sign on the dotted line, because you might have a dirt road there that you think that is
part of your property, that to get to, but you needed to have permission to be able to use that easement
to get to your property. You can find that out again, through the title office,
and your real estate agent and listing agent should
have the information for you about the
easements of the property you're about to purchase. The biggest key when
buying a lot is the fact that you have to do your
research ahead of time. You've done a soil sample, you've done a flood determination, you know what the setbacks
are on the property, you know what the easements
are on that property. If you've done your homework you're gonna know what
the local ordinances are for the size of the structure you plan on building in the future, and if it allows for
sheds and farm equipment. You're also gonna know what the zoning is, and if it's agriculture, and if you can rent that
land out to local farmers so you can get a tax credit. Now you know all this stuff, I hope you enjoy your new piece of land. If you'd like to watch
some more videos from me go ahead and click this video right here. My name is Kristina Smallhorn,
your real estate whisper. And I tell you all this, because good real estate
information matters.
