A "splitable" lot wasn't actually splitable after digging into the records
I reviewed a vacant lot this week for someone who wanted to know whether it had future upside beyond building one home.
At first glance, it looked promising. Corner lot, decent size, growing area.
The listing didn't say it could be split, but it also didn't say it couldn't, so I started digging.
The deed showed a recorded easement running along one side of the property.
FEMA maps showed that same side was affected by the floodplain.
Then I checked the local zoning requirements against the recorded dimensions. The lot came up just short of the minimum needed to create two conforming lots.
None of those findings by themselves would've changed my opinion much.
Together, they answered the question pretty clearly.
It reminded me how often the value of a parcel comes down to understanding its constraints, not just its location or acreage. Two buyers can look at the same listing and come away with completely different valuations depending on what they uncover in the public records.
I wasn't trying to "find a problem." I was just trying to answer one question: What can this property realistically become?
That's usually where I start whenever I'm looking at vacant land.