One of the most important things to check when purchasing a piece of property is the title. Why? Well, think of it like this: suppose someone came to you and offered to sell you a car. They point over their shoulder and start telling you all about this brand new car that they are willing to sell you CHEAP.

Great! But wait…what’s the catch? Well, if you don’t check the title, this person could take your cash, hand you a set of keys, and vanish. You go up to the car and realize those keys don’t even fit the lock. The seller never even owned the car! This happens all the time when buying land.

Yikes! So how do we protect ourselves???

The first answer is to hire a title company. A reputable title company will perform the important research on things like:

• Is the seller the owner of record?
• Are their any liens, encumbrances, or taxes owed?
• Who owns the mineral rights?

While a title company can’t tell you everything about a piece of raw land, they can tell you A LOT. But a good title company is not cheap. Just look at how many steps are involved in closing with a title company:

For many small parcels of land, hiring a title company can be more expensive than the land itself!

What can you do to protect yourself without hiring a title company?

1. Call the county. Typically the county clerk or recorder will be able to provide you any deeds that have been recorded for a property. Also, if any liens have been recorded, the county should be able to provide those too.
   • PRO TIP: Many counties offer electronic copies of deeds and other documents, often it’s as easy as finding the county website and navigating to the right page. Typically they will charge a nominal fee ($2-$5) for a copy of the latest deed, which you can access online.
2. Hire an abstractor.Abstractors are professional researchers: they are able to perform research on a property’s title and also find liens that have been recorded with the county. In fact, many title companies hire abstractors to perform research on the title.

So now that you know HOW to find information on a property, in our next post we’ll tell you exactly WHAT to look for.

Due Diligence is crucial when purchasing land, so we wanted to give our customers some tips on how to protect themselves and feel confident when buying land. In the next few posts we’ll explore the main concepts of Due Diligence as it applies to raw land investing.

What is Due Diligence? According to Investopedia:

Due diligence (DD) is an investigation or audit of a potential investment. Due diligence serves to confirm all material facts in regards to a sale.

Generally, due diligence refers to the care a reasonable person should take before entering into an agreement or a transaction with another party.

Basically, you are doing research to make sure that you understand the most important details of the asset that you are buying. With land, we’re talking about things like a clean title, taxes and fees, access, zoning, location, utilities, water, and many other factors. The importance of these things varies depending on what you want to do with the land. If you are going to build, you’d better make sure that the zoning allows you to put up your house. If you are just going to use the property for occasional hunting or camping, zoning issues might be less important.

If you’ve never done Due Diligence before, this process can seem overwhelming. However, there is a step-by-step progression that we here at Wilco Land follow. In the next few posts, we’ll dive into our process so that you can perform your own Due Diligence, or at least understand the important questions you need to ask before purchasing raw land.

Where to begin? In our next post, we’ll talk about the first step: determining a clean chain of title.

Developing land can be a great investment, but preparation is key. Want to ensure your land development goes smoothly? Follow these tips:

1. Identify a general area. You may want to keep your first project close to home, where personal connections can help you with both the red tape and your search for a trustworthy, high-quality builder.
2. Carefully consider the project size and scale. You’ll also want to look at what you can afford as likely be paying for some or all of the development costs with a loan. The size of the loan you can get depends on factors like your income, assets and how much experience you have with developing. Talking with a local banker can help you get a better sense of the loan size you can expect to get. More experienced developers may want to consider other options for financing, such as attracting individual investors or contracting with a seller who can help shoulder development costs.
3. Find the right piece of land. Once you’ve got your target property and your budget, you can start looking for vacant land. Look at several properties that fit within your size and budget requirements and then analyze the locations. To do this, it helps to think from the future owner’s point-of-view. If you’re building a family home, you’ll want to look at the quality of schools, access to parks and the distance from the city or office developments where the owner is likely to be employed.
4. Controlling your costs and schedule. Once you’ve decided on a property you can move on to more in-depth planning. You can start by creating a master schedule, a key tool that can help you keep your land development project under control. Write down each step in the order it should be performed in, starting with planning and continuing through each step in the permitting process. While many tasks can be handled at the same time, keeping an orderly, updated schedule will make sure you don’t cause delays by missing vital steps. This is important, since the sooner you start construction, the less interest you’ll accumulate on your loan.
5. Build a great team. Another way to keep your project on track is to work with quality contractors. While it may cost more to hire someone who works to a high standard, it can actually be more costly to work with someone who does subpar work. If planning boards ask for changes in design or city engineers cite you for not being up to code, it can cause costly delays. Working with people with a good reputation and inspecting the site often can make sure that quality stays high. And in the end, a commitment to quality will likely pay off a second time, when you start marketing your development to buyers.