Florida
I bid on and was high bidder in an auction for a piece of land. The owner is a local bank. Before the purchase I contacted the county P&Z department to ask about the status of the land and was told that it had been illegally subdivided from the parent parcel, but that the subdivision would be a fairly simple thing to do. I then contacted the selling agent and asked about this, he said yes the bank was aware of the problem and was in the process of getting the legal subdivision done. He suggested that if I was worried I could put a clause into the contract requiring that the subdivision be done before closing. So I bid, was high bidder and added the following clause to the contract:
“Before closing buyer expects that the subdivision of this property from the original XXX property be complete and legally approved by Wakulla County resulting in a buildable property.”
The bank accepted and signed the contract with that clause in it.
Since then I have been talking with others at the county tell me that the subdivision may not be so easy and that even if it is subdivided wetlands may make the lot unbuildable. The property does have a creek on one side and I know from the survey that a lot of the land is in a flood plain, but not all. To my untrained eye I see very little wetland other than right along the creek; the creek bank is steep and rises about 10 ft very quickly after leaving the creek. The lot is about 6 acres, I only want to be able to build a single home on it, and do not care if most of the land is wetland, actually I like to look at the water so that is fine with me, but I do want to be able to build one house.
Assuming the bank is successful in getting a legal subdivision how do I assure that the lot is buildable? Will title insurance help? Would it even be legal to subdivide unbuildable land? My plan was to hold this land for 10 or 20 years before building when I retire. I don’t want to buy something now and find years from now it is not buildable. If I get wetlands delineation done now will it still be valid in the future?
I bid on and was high bidder in an auction for a piece of land. The owner is a local bank. Before the purchase I contacted the county P&Z department to ask about the status of the land and was told that it had been illegally subdivided from the parent parcel, but that the subdivision would be a fairly simple thing to do. I then contacted the selling agent and asked about this, he said yes the bank was aware of the problem and was in the process of getting the legal subdivision done. He suggested that if I was worried I could put a clause into the contract requiring that the subdivision be done before closing. So I bid, was high bidder and added the following clause to the contract:
“Before closing buyer expects that the subdivision of this property from the original XXX property be complete and legally approved by Wakulla County resulting in a buildable property.”
The bank accepted and signed the contract with that clause in it.
Since then I have been talking with others at the county tell me that the subdivision may not be so easy and that even if it is subdivided wetlands may make the lot unbuildable. The property does have a creek on one side and I know from the survey that a lot of the land is in a flood plain, but not all. To my untrained eye I see very little wetland other than right along the creek; the creek bank is steep and rises about 10 ft very quickly after leaving the creek. The lot is about 6 acres, I only want to be able to build a single home on it, and do not care if most of the land is wetland, actually I like to look at the water so that is fine with me, but I do want to be able to build one house.
Assuming the bank is successful in getting a legal subdivision how do I assure that the lot is buildable? Will title insurance help? Would it even be legal to subdivide unbuildable land? My plan was to hold this land for 10 or 20 years before building when I retire. I don’t want to buy something now and find years from now it is not buildable. If I get wetlands delineation done now will it still be valid in the future?
