When shopping for a building lot, you will likely consider its location,
purchase price, size, and shape - with good reason. Where you live, the size of
your construction budget, and how much land you have and can effectively use
will impact your selection.
The choice of location is likely to be determined by a variety of
considerations. The type of neighborhood, tax rate, length of commute to work,
and quality of the school system are likely to be important. Proximity to family
and friends, the distance to shopping centers, and access to recreational
activities might also matter. Privacy, traffic noise, and what you can do with
the lot (such as put in a swimming pool) may be paramount concerns.
The location of a building lot is seldom in itself of special consequence
when considering a modular home. However, the route to the site, as well as its
size and shape, can occasionally pose delivery difficulties. Also, building lots
sometimes come with covenants, deed restrictions, or easements that can restrict
what you can and cannot build. For those on a budget, the price of the building
lot will affect how much money is left over to build a house.
Land costs in many areas have risen appreciably in recent years. In some
areas, the rise has been astronomical. Buying a piece of property is one thing,
but turning it into a usable building lot can be a different matter entirely.
There are many factors in developing land that can add thousands of dollars to
the cost of building a house. If you are unprepared for these costs, they can
make a complete mess of your budget.
This chapter will help you understand the many factors that impact on making
a raw piece of land into a viable building lot. Whether or not you already have
your land, this chapter will help you assess the total costs of preparing the
site, which in turn can make it easier to decide how much you can afford to
spend on the house itself. To learn more about how a GC can address the
challenges posed by building lots, see chapter 7 (51 pages), “The General
Contractor’s Responsibilities”, in The Modular Home (310 pages) by Andrew
Gianino.
The Victorian features are crafted within the modules, saving
on-site work
Searching for a Building Lot
The zoning regulations in this town require a minimum
building lot of 25,000 square feet and 150' of frontage. The regulations
also require the home to be located at least 20' away from the side and
rear property lines and 50' from the road. |
This chapter discusses the relative merits of four ways to find a building
lot. It also explains how you can use the help of an experienced general
contractor to determine what you can and cannot do with a particular property
and what types of homes will work best on it. It discusses how the GC can
conduct some "exploratory digging" to determine if there is a high water table,
rock, ledge, clay, or other potential difficulties. In addition, this chapter
answers the following important questions:
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What does it mean to have clear title to a property and how can you protect
yourself against a title flaw?
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What are covenants and deed restrictions and how might they affect your
ability to build on your property?
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What are easements and right-of-way restrictions and how might they affect
your ability to build on your property?
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How will your town's zoning requirements dictate what you can and cannot
build?
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What are your responsibilities and vulnerabilities if pollution is found on
your site and what can you do to minimize this risk?
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What is the significance of owning a lot that is in a designated flood
plane?
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Who determines whether your property has any "wetlands" and what must you
do if it does?
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Why should you have a property formally surveyed and boundary markers put
in place, if these have not been done, before purchasing it?
Since these issues are so important, this chapter recommends several
contingencies that you should add to your offer-to-purchase when you identify a
lot that meets your needs. These contingencies will allow you to withdraw your
offer and receive a full deposit refund if you discover a problem with the lot
before you conclude your purchase.
Fixed and Variable Construction Costs
When comparing one building lot with another, there are a number of
construction costs that are relatively fixed and predictable. For example, the
costs to complete the button-up work after your home is set on the foundation
are seldom affected by the features of the land. A competent modular-home
company can give you a good idea of these costs without knowing much about your
property.
There are a number of other costs, however, that vary significantly from lot
to lot. For example, the costs to excavate the foundation and bring water and
sewage capability to a home can vary significantly from one lot to another.
These variable costs can add up to some surprising numbers from a contractor.
They will only be surprising, however, if you are unaware of what is involved in
developing raw land into a building lot. The goal of this chapter is to
eliminate that surprise by explaining the significance of the following:
Choosing the Best Location
When you first start thinking about where to locate your home on a building
lot, you will likely think about how you would prefer it to look from the
street, which parts you want bathed by sunlight, and what you intend to do with
the yard. To meet these personal goals, you need to take into account the
topography of the lot, or the "lay of the land."
The shape, size, and existing slopes, or "grades," of the lot will influence
where best to place a home. Other factors include trees and open spaces, streams
and ponds, and existing stone walls and driveways. The lot's location relative
to the surrounding properties will also affect your decision.
Since a property's topography can also play a determining role in the type of
home you can build and how much it will cost to complete the work, this chapter
discusses several of the issues you need to consider.
Clearing the Land
Some lots are densely wooded with trees and brush while others are completely
cleared. The cost of cutting down the trees, chipping the brush and limbs,
removing the logs, and digging up and burying or disposing of the stumps can be
substantial. While lumber companies will pay for the chance to cut some kinds of
trees, most building lots do not have enough of the right type and size to help
the customer avoid paying for their removal.
Sometimes building a modular home means having to remove more trees than
would be necessary with another type of construction. This is particularly true
when a tree or two obstructs the delivery or set of your home. In most
circumstances, however, the type of construction does not affect the number of
trees that need to be removed where you will locate your house.
The
recessed entry, cantilevered front, and brick kneewall make this a classic
American raised ranch
Excavation, Trenching, and Grading
After clearing the land you will need to excavate a hole for the foundation.
The cost of excavation varies considerably from lot to lot. The difference
depends largely on whether the land has ledge, rock, big boulders, hardpan,
clay, or other difficult soil and subsurface conditions. Extensive deposits of
ledge and rock require blasting, which is expensive, and large boulders and
hardpan may require more powerful and expensive excavation equipment. Clay is
very difficult to work with, particularly when wet.
Because large boulders, hardpan, clay, and the debris left over from blasting
ledge are usually unfit for backfilling around the foundation or for bringing
the grades around the house to the appropriate levels, additional fill is almost
always required when these conditions are present. Buying, delivering, and
spreading additional fill can add significantly to excavation costs. Because
ensuring a dry basement is an important objective for most customers, this
chapter discusses some of the issues you need to consider to achieve this
result.
Excavation work is also required for connecting your home to underground
municipal water and sewer lines or a well and septic system. Trenches are
required if you are running underground utility lines for electrical, telephone,
or cable services.
Creating the appropriate grades on a lot is critical to minimizing water
problems, making the site usable, and making the driveway accessible. Although
you will want to direct water away from your home, you will need to do it
without causing problems for the neighbors. You will also want to take into
account how water from neighboring properties flows onto your property.
Additional grading may be needed to make the site accessible for the modular
transporters and the crane on delivery and set day. If the lot is made up of
many rough and uneven hills, the task can be more difficult for the excavator
and thus more expensive. If additional fill is required to complete the grading,
your costs will also increase.
Municipal Water and Sewer
Some lots come with municipal water and sewer lines already available, often
by the side of the road. Others may have only one of these available. Many lots,
particularly in rural areas, have neither. The availability of municipal water
and sewer connections typically reduces the cost of developing the land. This is
because without them you must drill a well and install a septic system, both of
which tend to cost more than their municipal alternatives. This is not always
the case, however, since some towns have an expensive hookup fee.
Municipal water- and sewer-hookup costs are affected by the distance of the
home from the road and by the type of land that must be crossed. Land that is
heavily wooded may require additional tree clearing. Land that is spiked with
rock and ledge may require additional blasting.
Public Utility Hookups
Customers often underestimate what is involved in hooking up to public water
and sewer. When the hookups are in a new subdivision, the task is usually easy
and uninvolved. But if you are connecting to services that have been in place
for many years, you could run into a situation that will complicate this task
considerably. This chapter discusses nine of these situations.
Septic Systems
If the property does not have public sewer, you will need to have a private
septic system installed. A septic system is built according to a set of
engineered plans, called a septic design, drawn by a licensed sanitarian or
engineer. As indicated elsewhere in this chapter, the design is itself based
upon the results of a perc test, which measures permeability by counting the
average number of minutes per inch it takes water to percolate through the
subsoil in a test pit.
When buying land that requires a septic system, ask the seller for a copy of
the perc test results, which you should verify have not expired. Should a
prospective lot not yet have a valid perc test, do not purchase the lot until a
test is completed unless you have compelling evidence that it will pass.
Otherwise, you may discover you own a lot that you cannot build on. The expense
for a perc test is almost always borne by the seller.
Installation costs for septic systems vary significantly, depending on how
the soil conditions, perc rates, and ground water determine the engineered
designs. If the septic design requires many truckloads of additional fill, the
costs can increase by thousands of dollars. Fortunately, an experienced
subcontractor can usually give you a reasonable estimate of the costs before you
buy the land. This chapter explains how to obtain an estimate.
Drilling a Well
It is almost impossible to estimate in advance how much it will cost to drill
a well. Many people mistakenly claim that if you know how your new neighbors
faired with their well, you can have a good idea of what you are likely to find
with yours. That is often not true at all. Even an experienced driller cannot
predict with certainty how many feet he will have to drill on your property
before he reaches sufficient water, nor can he tell you how many feet of metal
casing he will need to use, since this will depend on when he hits bedrock. In
addition, he cannot tell you how much pressure he will find when he hits water.
Without knowing these facts in advance, he also cannot know how large of a pump
he will be needed to bring the water to the house. The best protection is to set
aside a sizable amount of money as a contingency for excessive well-drilling
costs.
Foundation
The cost of putting in a foundation is primarily determined by the size of
the home, but there are costs associated with installing a foundation that
depend on lot conditions as well. For example, if a foundation will be located
on a slope, it will require more excavation, a larger foundation, or both to
create a level platform. In cold climates, building codes require the
installation of "frost walls" below ground to protect the foundation footings
from frost heaves. In much of the Northeast, for example, foundation walls and
their footings must be buried at least 4 feet. If the grade is such that one or
more of the standard height foundation walls will not be covered with 4 feet or
more of fill, the bottom of the walls and footings must be extended into the
ground to achieve this depth. Building these frost walls, which can make the
total foundation wall as much as 12-feet tall when combined with an 8-foot
basement, will add appreciably to the cost.
Building a walk-out basement with full-size windows and sliders is usually a
better way of handling a slopped property with a full basement, since it makes
the basement more usable and access to the yard easier. In cold climates, if the
walk-out walls are completely above ground, a frost wall will need to be built
in addition to these 8-foot-high wood-framed walls. The number of windows and
doors added to the walk-out walls will also add to the cost, since windows and
doors cost more than the foundation they replace.
With a high water table, water can be kept out of the basement with a
drainage system and a raised foundation, as discussed above. Additional
protection can be offered with special waterproofing products that are applied
to the foundation. The traditional approach of applying asphalt coating to the
walls does not really waterproof the basement. True waterproofing products come
with a guarantee. They cost more, but they also deliver better results.
If you are building in an area where soil or seismic conditions create the
potential for additional stress to the foundation, you may need to make it
stronger. This may mean, for example, thicker walls reinforced by steel bars,
which will increase the cost.
Landscaping
Most aspects of landscaping are decided by personal taste and budget.
However, the land does influence which alternatives are most practical. Some
land lends itself to inexpensive landscaping while other lots require more
extensive work. For example, a flat lot that contains few trees or shrubs might
require an extensive lawn. If this same lot has poor soil for growing grass, it
might require loam to be trucked in.
