THINGS TO KNOW WHEN BUYING LAND
Looking to buy some land and build your dream home? Well, that dream can turn into a nightmare if you don’t know exactly what you’re purchasing. Here are some tips to help you get the best out of your new land purchase.
Zoning
Most land is zoned for a particular purpose, such as residential, industrial, commercial or recreational. When purchasing land, you need to make sure it’s in a residential zoned area, or you could have major problems when you try to build your home. The best thing you can do is check with the local council in your area, although your real estate agent should also be able to give you all the zoning information for a particular plot of land. Still, it never hurts to double check.
Always inspect the land personally
The other thing to consider is what the land actually looks like. Photos online usually look great, but they’re often taken for that very purpose. It always pays to go and visit the land yourself before any purchase. This ensures you see the whole property, not just the parts the real estate wants you to see online. There could be huge areas of overgrowth, access may be problematic, or the land could be sloped a lot more than the photo shows. All of these things can complicate the building process.
Check the soil quality
While most building companies recommend soil testing before starting a build, this can often be too late for many customers. If there are issues around soil quality, it can be a costly situation to deal with. This is a particularly important thing to consider if you’re building an acreage home in Queensland. That is if you want to do any sort of farming or raising of livestock. Soil quality plays a big part in how successful that venture will be, so it’s worth checking well in advance.
Before you sign on the dotted line for any land purchase, it’s good practice to consider soil testing in advance.
Water, power, and access
When buying land in normal residential areas, these issues don’t crop up too often. You’ll be connected to town water, electricity is no problem, and there’s usually easy access to the site for our builders. However, if the land you’re buying is more remote, you’ll need to think about all of these things.
Your builders need good access to the worksite, meaning you may have the expense of clearing a driveway before you even get started. If you need your own water and wastewater setup, this may be required before building. Also, builders need access to power during the build, so this will need to be sorted beforehand.
