All Forum Posts by: Jamie Hora

Are you thinking about passing down land that you would want your family members to sell? Or for it to be a generational vacation spot?  Two very different thoughts there.  

Its a personal question.  I like the idea of possible farmland thats in proximity to either lakes/rivers with the idea of it being a possible vacation spot or homestead of a family member down the road.  I would be less concerned about trying to pick land based on future appreciation & selling. 

That question cannot be answered in definite terms.  Development projects can vary from a 1-lot Single Family home to 20-acre subdivision, to a 4-acre commercial site, etc. 

I'm a civil engineer, and for example, I do the civil engineering/permitting for many Gas-Station & Convenience Store. Our fees are not based on the profit or value of the project.  Its a per-service fee.  I.E., how much design work does the civil engineer need to do.  For a Gas-Station with total development cost of ~$1.5M, I will tell you our fees would be nowhere near 33% of that. 

Fee for professional services are not typically based on the profit or value of the project. Its a per-service cost. I.E., how much design work does the civil engineer need to do. The requirements from projects/jurisdiction's varies greatly. Also, logically speaking, for whoever the owner/developer of the project is, they have much more risk involved and should deservedly be the ones with the profit to gain. 

I specialize in the civil engineering & permitting for any land development type project.  Probably 75% of my focus is commercial work, and the other is residential developments.  I help developers with initial due-diligence & feasibility on site selection, and then all parts relating to civil/site permitting: rezoning, platting, civil design, etc. 

I really love my role in the industry.  Maybe one day I'll work on a development myself, but for now, I'm happy doing the engineering aspect.  I'm licensed in Texas, Arizona & Arkansas. 

Getting a civil engineer and/or architect with experience in the area will be able to guide you through much of this.  Also, you can meet with City staff to discuss your questions as well for you to gain the knowledge yourself before paying an engineer. 

I am not sure on single vs multi-tenant options, that is outside of my experience. I believe you would look at market analysis of what tenants would be in each of those scenarios and compare the proforma on each. 

There are plenty of tenants that can accommodate with a < 1 acre lot. You are in line with your thinking on some newer banks and/or coffee drive through shops.  There are drive-thru only coffee shops with buildings ~500 sq ft.  The main challenge with some of these are the dimensions of your lot and configuring the site to allow the minimum stacking of vechicles.

Depending on your use, a 5000 sq ft building may be tough to fit in this size lot when looking at how much parking you want/need, building setbacks, landscaping setbacks etc.   

Very nice, congrats!

There is a large piece that you didnt mention, the actual cost of the development. You may have a grasp on this aspect, but there are items to consider that can play a big factor when choosing your land such as topography, existing zoning & platted lot status, minimum/maximum requirements such as parking, detention, size of building, setbacks.  

Timelime of the project can be heavily impacted by which agencies are required for permitting. It is only within a county, or need City approvals, or possibly DOT approvals for driveway connection, etc. A local engineer can help understand all of these items.

Good luck on the project. 

Hi Bryan, I'm a civil engineer and am familiar with things like this.  Uneven terrain may not be an issue but yes it would require leveling for your garage slabs.  Depending on the dimensions of your tract, your goal should be to orient your garages with the elevation difference going front-back or back-front.  That will allow areas outside of the slab to be less affected and limit the required work to place the pads on even ground. 

If that does not work with your site and the contours/grades are dropping/rising along the longitudinal with of the garages, that can cause much more site work.  In that case, you would likely need several separate slabs, with some separation between them, versus a 200' wide slab with 8 garages. 

That is the concept how things like rows of apartment garages and storage units can be laid out in areas with lots of grade change.  But more creative solutions are likely site dependent specific to your situation. 

I do not think the location of a railroad would have any impact of the rezoning for the apartment usage.  This would be more dependent on the  surrounding zoning, future land-use maps by the City, and the City's input. 

One possible large impact would be a minimum setback requirement from the railroad to any development, which could drastically cut the usable land.