First lot split at home, or the easier county three hours away

Before voting either way, the thing to check on the easy county is whether the process is actually easy or just easy on paper. A friendly subdivision ordinance and a backed up environmental review sit with two different agencies, and the second one can be the real gate if the health department takes five months on septic approvals. Parcel, when you say administrative sign off, does that include whatever the state requires for on site sewage on new lots, or is that a separate track?

Separate track almost everywhere, and anchor's question is the right one. In many counties a planner will sign a three lot split in two weeks, and the septic evaluation is the thing that decides whether there are three lots at all. Home county is the better default anyway, for an unglamorous reason. With out of area holdings the cost isn't the drive, it's missing information. Nobody calls an owner when a road project gets funded or a new well restriction shows up. In a home county, that news travels at the counter.

The rural county is usually the stronger play, since that is where most administrative-process splits actually get done. But the smaller spread matters more than the post makes it sound. Say lots retail at $32k out there and the split costs $9k in survey, recording and soft costs. Three lots is $96k gross, and the process ate almost 10% before the land itself was paid for. In a $90k lot market that same $9k is nearly nothing. The easy ordinance is cheap in dollars and expensive as a percentage.

Asking the thing I'd feel silly asking out loud. If I buy in a county three hours away and split it, am I selling those lots myself, and does doing that repeatedly turn into something that needs a license? I know licensing rules are state by state, I just don't know what the trigger even is for selling land you own.

Compass, selling your own property is usually fine and it's selling for other people that triggers licensing, but where the line sits and how many transactions start to look like a business varies by state, so that's a question for someone licensed there.

On the actual poll I'm voting for the third option and I know it's the boring vote. I've spent four months reading ordinances in two counties and the parcels that make money are the ones where somebody else already did the hard part or where the ordinance never made it hard. Parcel, do you actually see split-ready parcels come up often enough that waiting for one is a strategy, or is that just how I avoid deciding?