If I had a dollar for every time a client asked us to
determine where the wetlands were on a piece of property after they bought it...well, I wouldn’t
be rich but I’d certainly be better off. It happens every day – that dream lot
comes up for sale and gets snatched up. It is only later, when the building
process is initiated, that nasty problems like restrictive wetland rules that
could kill the dream are discovered. Sometimes it is obvious why there is one
conspicuous undeveloped lot along the lakeshore. A lot consisting entirely of a
cattail marsh should be a dead giveaway to even the least knowledgeable since
almost everyone knows that there are wetland rules out there, even if they don’t
understand the regulatory process or how it might affect them. However, it is
those pesky wetlands disguised as meadows or forests that can fool even the
most savvy buyer.
And don’t think that wetland regulations can only affect you if there are wetlands on your property. Wetland rules sometimes require setbacks from wetland or waterbody boundaries. This means that your ability to build on your lot could be affected by wetlands that are not even located on your property.
All of these are good reasons to put “environmental compliance” on your checklist as you go through your due-diligence when purchasing a piece of property. But one of the biggest reasons, commonly overlooked, is that wetland should have less market value than upland because of rules that restrict their use. Properties are frequently sold with no regard to the fact that wetlands exist – wetlands that could prevent or make very difficult the possibility of developing on the land. The cost of going through a wetland permitting process (a process that has no guarantee of success) is frequently not considered as part of the cost of buying and developing single lots or even several lots in a planned development.
Mike Graham
