What A Coup!!!
After 7 months of negotiating for a tract of land (200 acres) near our weekend home in upstate NY, today I finally walked away with a contract containg a six month due diligence!!!!
The major brokers in the area are amazed that I, as a lonley weekend home owner was sucessful in this deal of prime build able acreage (R1 zoning). In fact one broker stated that I have accomplished what most brokers have been trying to do for the past 10 years and that was to just get a number out of the owner.
I need to fill you all in without going into too much detail, but the seller of this property I would consider to be one of the top 5 realty moguls in Manhattan!! Yes, I really believe I scored big here. In fact, during our most recent meeting, he actually offered to JV with us and I agreed to run some numbers to see if this makes sense. By doing so, he offered to lower the price by 600K!
So here I am now with contract in hand
and six month to decide where I want to take this property. It can yield just about 40 lots with captivating views on one of the last large tracts of land available in our town.
My options are to...
JV with the seller.
Flip and take some $$$plus a few acres.
or build on our own.
The later not being so feasible as I believe the $$ committment is a little to risky for me.
I would like to hear your thoughts on this and any opinions are appreciated.
The property is raw, but there is a sketch plan from 1996 that we are working from.
Perc and soil test are fine. 100 acres are wetlands and we would like to look into the benefit of donating this to an entity (not the city). There are roughly 100 acres that we can build on and each lot being R1 is restricted to 40,000 sq ft per home.
Look forward to hearing what you all think, Flyboy
<IMG SRC="images/forum/smilies/icon_cool.gif"> <IMG SRC="images/forum/smilies/icon_cool.gif"> <IMG SRC="images/forum/smilies/icon_cool.gif"> ps..I bought Nancy's book and would like to say, thanks! Good stuff.[ Edited by flyboy on Date 02/06/2004 ]
As a newbie, I didn't understand half of what you said, but you sound excited, so congratulations!!
[ Edited by clegg on Date 02/06/2004 ]
[ Edited by NancyChadwick on Date 02/07/2004 ]
I just noticed your PS. Thanks. [ Edited by NancyChadwick on Date 02/07/2004 ]
Flyboy,
Good to meet you.
The course of actions I would take would be phased and increasing in cost.
The first stuff you do is the free and cheap things, and if the deals passes that muster - you start spending a little money.
In the low cost category
1. Find any and all previous survey work, environmental, zoning, previous permits etc.. For the previous "sketch plan" there has to be a survey and perhaps a TOPO.
2. Meet with the appropriate city/county planners and engineers. Do this in person and pick their brains a bit. Have a list of questions prepared. Look for the road blocks that would kill the deal, define the potential road blocks you can drive around. (Ask help from the bureaucrats in telling the difference.)
3. Get an environmental done. If you ahae a topo and survey this will be cheap and will tell you if there is a deal killer.
4. Interview a few land planning firms. Pick their brains, get proposals form them.
Now you spend a bit
4. Get a survey and topo (define wetlands)
5. Hire a civil engineering firm to do a due diligence review.
You have identified your land, you need to identify your market and then your product. Get some marketing people involved during this process to determine your product and pricing. Keep these in mind during your due diligence.
These are the things I would start with anyway.
Gregg
_________________
Gregg Fous
Investor/Developer
"Under-promise and over-deliver"[ Edited by GFous on Date 02/07/2004 ]
That is soooo cool! Congrats!
t
Gfous,
Thanks for your response. I pretty much have been following your suggestions.
My course of plan is to....
See engineers (again)
Get the site plan determined for yield.
Make sure no upzoning or any other surprise may be lurking.
Need to wait for the snow to leave to perform delineation's, perks (again), and wetland survey's.
I pretty sure where the wetlands are and they should not present any problems with development.
I dont know what your level of experience is, or what type of deal you are doing and who your partners are. mabe you've got everything worked out. If you do that is great! If you dont you ought to team up with Gfous, if you and or he is interested. Gfous appears (i have followed his posts and articles) to be a very experienced developer with several big projects under his belt and some going on now. All of it is WAY over my head. Congrats!! Wouldnt mind
hearing more deails as they develope!!
_________________
B.G. & Wheeler D. LLc Inc. and Trust
(A division of: Half Vast Enterprises)
"Most american millionairs today (about 80%) are first generation rich"[ Edited by WheelerDealer on Date 02/09/2004 ]
Wheeler Dealer - Thanks for the compliment.
I thought I would share an exciting deal that I just got fantastic news on today.
I made an offer on 17 acres. It took about six weeks of back and forth to make the deal. Price $625,000. Terms: $10,000 now, goes hard at 150 days, then another $30,000. Closing before the end of this year.
During negotiaitons I was given a very old site plan for an adult community on the site. Was advised that the plan has expired. Density was a question, first blush looked like 110 units. Plan was unclear. Wetlands an Issue- we got an aerial from the county and can see a few spots. Old site plan confirms. Gopher tortise issue a real threat. All this covered in due diligence clause.
Keep in mind, on this kind of offer, I have my attorney draw up very specific language particluar to this land.
In any case - we signed the deal two days ago and began serious due diligence. First step was to go to the county and pull all docs related to the site. Then we visited with the engineer that did the old site plan.
The plan is 9.5 years old. Turns out, ten years ago the site plans did not expire in five years like they do now. They expire in ten. This was news to me and unknown to the seller ( Who was gifted the property)
This one will expire June 24th THIS YEAR!! and is for 157 Units!!
All we have to do now is submit for the D.O . before that date.
I called the seller and asked it we could go hard early - say in 45 days - once I know there are no deal killers. Once we go hard can we do the hard engineering for the site plan. He agreed.
If there are no deal killers (environmental, new flood elevations etc)
This property is TODAY worth twice what I paid for it since it now has an active Site Plan.
Some times the bear eats you and some time you eat the bear. This time I ate the bear.
I love this country!!
[addsig]
Gfous, I love bear meat!
I met with a local engineer yeaterday who agreed that the property I have under contract is one of the last remaining QUALITY sites in town. His initial feeling is the Town will accept any reasonable plan submitted.
So first we agreed to have an aerial fly over and shoot the topo's. This should be completed within a week. Secondly, he is taking the previous sketch plan and re-working it to allow for a shorter road and higher density of lots! With this new road, it will allow for at least 8 road frontage lots without taking away the beauty of the remaining acreage.
I should have the new sketch plan and pricing for all the engineering and survey work later this week.[ Edited by flyboy on Date 02/11/2004 ]
Sorry for the delay in updating this coup!
Received the new sketch plan and the news was great. We now have the ability to erect 55 lots. The town already approved the three roads from the plan and the aerial topo flight proved beneficial to our development ideas.
This yield has created much interest from developers in the surrounding area. We have not ruled out flipping this property, but the more due diligence we perform, the better it looks for us to develop!
The site offers us the ability to start with 5 lots immediately while at the same time deal with the town on the larger parcel. These five lots will allow us to get working capital as well as place a model home on one of the five lots for potential customers for the larger parcel.
This is all very exciting and what I look forward to the most, is being able to work outdoors for the next 7 months!
I imagine I will hit a few speed bumps slong the way, but I'll treat them as a challenge and not an obstacle.
Stay Tuned
Flyboy-
Congratulations - Keep us posted as you progress.
Update on the deal I mentioned - I just put two parcels in friont of the 17 acres under contract - both commericial. I believe these parcels will be positively affected ( price wise) when we announce our community. WE wil tie them up and then either build on them or flip them
[addsig]
Gfous...Will do. Taking some needed R&R and heading down to bike week for the races this Saturday. I certainly look forward to a warmer climate!
It's definitly warm down here. I'm about 60 miles north of Daytona, doors and windows open and 80 degrees right now!!
Flyboy,
Let us know how you make out on the waste water treatmant plant issues. I would be curious to know what your final costs per unit wind up being.
Gregg
county recorder