Pay the engineer before I make the offer, or tie the land up and figure it out on the clock?

Before you spend $3,200, spend an hour at the planning counter. Most counties will do a pre-application meeting for free or something close to it, and you can walk in with a parcel number and the ordinance section you can't parse and ask them to tell you which review track four lots lands on. That's a much cheaper answer to the exact question you're asking. Subdivision rules are local, so what your county calls a minor split and what mine calls one may be nothing alike, which is why the counter beats the internet.

What the planner won't do is commit. Anything you hear verbally is a read, not an approval, and staff turns over. So the pre-app narrows the range and the engineer prices the range. Do them in that order.

Dumb question, what's actually in a $3,200 feasibility letter? Is that a survey? I assumed a survey was the expensive part and I don't understand what you're buying if it isn't that.

The way I'd frame it is what does it cost to be wrong on each path. Losing $3,200 on a deal you don't get is annoying. Losing 90 days and finding out on day 80 that the county wants a paved road sounds worse to me, though I've never done one of these.

@parcel's order makes sense to me but I'd add that I've been told to get the pre-app notes in writing, or at least send your own summary email back to the planner afterward so there's a record of what you were told. Doesn't bind them. Still useful when the answer changes.

Contract with a refundable deposit and a study period long enough to be real, then spend. That's it. The whole point of the study period is that it's a paid option on information.

On small multifamily I never pay for an inspection before I'm under contract and I've never regretted it. But land is different in one way that matters here, harrow. On a building I know what I'm buying and I'm checking condition. On your 16 acres you don't know how many lots exist yet, which is the price itself. Checking condition can wait. Figuring out what the asset even is might not.

Will the county even talk to you about a parcel you don't own? I assumed you'd need the seller's permission for anything.

You don't need permission to ask a planner about a parcel. Public records, public ordinance.

harrow, one middle path nobody has said yet. A local land surveyor who does splits in that county all day will often give you a 20 minute read on the phone for nothing, because they want the plat work. They'll know instantly whether the county has been requiring a road on four lot splits lately. That's most of your $3,200 answer, and then you decide whether you still need the civil firm.

$3,200 as a percentage of what you'd lose by buying the wrong parcel is nothing. $3,200 spent four times on parcels you never win is $12,800 and no deal. Which of those you end up in depends on how many of these you're looking at per year. If this is your one shot, spend it. If you're going to look at twenty, you need a free screen first or you'll bleed out.

I'd want to know how long it's been listed before I'd worry about losing it. You said "a while." If it's been sitting 200 days, the competitive risk you're pricing into that $3,200 doesn't exist and you're just paying early for no reason.

The thing that kills these isn't the lot count, it's what the county attaches to the lot count. Stormwater management, road width, cul de sac turning radius, whether they'll accept a shared driveway easement for three lots or make you build to public standard. A planner will tell you the review track. An engineer will tell you what the review track costs to satisfy, and that number swings tens of thousands. That's the part I'd pay for, and I'd pay for it once I had the land locked up.

Following this because I'm at zero and this thread is the first time the sequence has made sense to me. Question though, if the study period turns up something bad and you walk, do you eat all the study cost yourself or is any of it recoverable from the seller?

You eat it, ember. That's the deal.

harrow, one wrinkle if you're borrowing any of the purchase. Some lenders on raw land want to see a feasibility or at least a survey before they'll size anything, so the spend can end up happening in due diligence whether you planned it or not. Ask your lender what they need in the file and get it in writing up front, because it varies a lot by lender and by how they treat land.

Is a paid option contract a thing on land like this, where you pay the seller a few thousand for the right to buy for six months? Or is that only a commercial development structure? I've read the phrase and I can't tell if it applies at this size.

vellum, it's a thing, sellers just mostly don't like it because the money is usually non refundable to them and small sellers want a normal contract. Terms and what makes it enforceable vary by state, so that's a lawyer question.

Let me put numbers on why I don't think this is close. 16 acres at $7,500 is $120,000. If four lots retail at $52,000 that's $208,000 gross, call it $193,000 after selling costs. Survey, plat, engineering, culverts and whatever the county wants, say $35,000 if it goes well. You're left around $38,000 on a $155,000 all in basis over a year and a half.

$3,200 is about 8% of that profit. And if the road standard turns out to be paved instead of gravel, the $35,000 becomes $90,000 and the deal is a loss. You're deciding whether to spend 8% of the upside to find out whether the downside exists. I'd spend it. The only question is whether you spend it before or after you have control, and that's a competition question, not a money question.

Had one die on day 62 of a 75 day study period. Engineer came back with a detention basin the county wanted and the basin ate a lot. Three lots instead of four and the three lot number didn't work. I got my deposit back and I was out about $6,000 in soft costs and two months of attention.

What I'd change is the order. I'd have called the engineer during week one instead of week five. The clock isn't the problem, harrow. Sitting on the clock is.

Whatever you do, get the study period language right. "Buyer may terminate for any reason during the study period and deposit is refunded" is different from a laundry list of specific contingencies, and how those get read and how the deposit is held differ by state. Have someone licensed in your state write it or review it once, then reuse it.

Genuinely curious how you'd explain a pre-offer feasibility spend to an outside investor. "I spent your $3,200 studying land we didn't buy" seems hard, even when it's the right call. Do people just budget a dead deal line and call it what it is?

Tie it up. Always tie it up. Contracts are cheap and free looks are the whole business. I've lost more money on deals I studied and didn't lock than I ever have on deposits.

harrow, your real problem isn't the $3,200, it's that you said a clock makes you make worse decisions. Then build the clock so it can't hurt you. 120 days instead of 90, engineer engaged the week you go hard on nothing, and a written walk right. If you can't get those terms, that tells you something about the seller too.

Depends entirely on how contested the parcel is. Multiple offer situation, you pay before, because information is your bid. Stale listing, you pay after, because you can get the control for free.

And separate from timing, I'd underwrite the deal at three lots, not four. If it only works at four you're paying $3,200 to hear a number you've already committed to.

The engineers I work with on the service side all do a free phone read. Twenty minutes, parcel number, they pull the aerials and the county GIS while you talk and tell you whether it's a normal split or a project. Then the paid letter is confirming something you already believe instead of discovering it.

harrow, call three firms in that county before you pay any of them. The variation in what they'll tell you for free is bigger than the variation in their fees.