Hard to believe isn’t it? Deeds frequently use vague language like “100 acres more or less” to describe a property, and that description is often based on the language in a previous deed, which got its language from a previous deed, and so on. Family members will property to their heirs using acreage assessments based on what great grand-daddy said his father told him. Unfortunately, tax records and many other legitimate looking documents rely on these unreliable sources for their information, without doing any verification. I see it all the time, and I’ve personally been involved in numerous transactions where acreages were off…..sometimes WAY off.

Here are a few more questions. When you see an aerial map, how can you be sure the lines are correct? When you see flagged or painted trees, how can you be sure the lines are marked correctly? When you see obvious physical property features like a fence line, an obvious change in timber, or a metal stake, how can you be sure that’s where the property line is? The short answer to all of the above is……You can’t!

Boundary line mistakes, inaccuracies, and disputes happen every day. Landowners, agents, foresters, loggers, neighbors, and fence installers often get it wrong. To make matters worse, sometimes the lines move. This happens when the boundaries are based on the physical location of creeks and streams, roads, or on agreements made between amiable neighbors with short memories, all of which can change over time. Legendary family feuds (think Hatfields and McCoys) have started over simple boundary line disputes.

So, as a buyer, how do verify acreage and boundary lines? The only reliable, verifiable, and dependable source of exact acreage is a survey, performed by a licensed surveyor. If you don’t have one of these, you don’t know and can’t know exactly what the acreage is. And, unless the property lines are surveyed and marked by a surveyor, you won’t know and can’t prove where those are either. You should be aware, however, that surveyors rarely clear and mark the lines (either with flagging or paint) as part of the surveying process. If you want clearly marked property lines, you’ll need to ask for it and be prepared to pay a little extra to get it.

Does this mean you need to pay for a survey every time you purchase property? Not necessarily. Sometimes surveys exist, but are not recorded or referenced in the deed. Sometimes there are extenuating circumstances in a deal where going without a survey is worth the risk. I’ve done it, but I don’t recommend it. However, if your purchase includes borrowing money from any lending institution, a title insurance policy, or subdividing a tract, you will almost always be required to have the property surveyed to close the deal. Even where there are existing, recorded surveys, there are times when paying for an updated survey is a good idea. When surveys are old (more than 25 years), there are possible boundary line encroachments or you suspect a potential dispute with a neighbor over fences, access, or easements, an updated survey is worth the investment. Remember that in any land deal everything is negotiable. If there is a potential dispute or uncertainty over acreage, boundary lines, easement location, or encroachments, it is not unreasonable to ask a seller to pay for all or part of the survey.

In any event, a good survey can provide some certainty around your land purchase and deliver some peace of mind, so you can be confident that the property you buy and the property you get are the same thing.

If you are a land buyer, whether you are a timber man, hunter, outdoor enthusiast, or stock market refugee, you are INVESTING. You perceive the land to be more valuable than the money you give for it. You purchase land with some expectation that the land ownership experience will benefit you in some way.  You are looking for some sort of return on investment, whether that return is measured in dollars, in trophy deer, memories with their family, or some combination of all of these.

That being the case, I think your approach to land ownership should be like that of an investor, and based on knowledge and objective evaluation criteria. By thinking like an investor you can better manage the process, better understand the approach, better understand the land, and better understand yourself. It’s a much better blueprint for success for land ownership.

You need to know how professional land investors evaluate and analyze property before they buy it. You must be wise about how you invest both your time and money, avoiding people and circumstances that get in your pocket or waste your time.

Investors (at least the good ones) go through a process of learning everything they can before they invest. They study the physical characteristics and components of the asset, they understand the market, they understand who their competition is, and what professional advice they need. It’s very analytical and unemotional. You need to think like that……like an investor.

Investors know they have to be able to do two things:

• Act quickly when an opportunity presents itself
• Recognize an opportunity when they see it.

Being able to act quickly is a function of getting your finances in order. We talked about that in a previous article, and it is pretty straightforward - Don’t buy more than you can afford. But, recognizing an opportunity when you see one is not so cut and dried. In fact, it is downright difficult, and determining price or value is the part of the process that most folks (even the professionals) struggle with the most.

And here is the problem. No two pieces of land are exactly the same. You simply can’t boil land value down to a black or white decision. What is land worth? Well….it depends. Factors like location, access, water sources, timber, zoning, wildlife, topography and market trends all impact land value and desirability, and ALL of these can vary in importance depending on what part of the country you are in. These physical characteristics are what determine the potential usage of land, and since a property’s value is ultimately based on how it can be used, here is where the value is determined.

So what do you do? How will you be able to know an opportunity when you see one? Well, a little research and a lot of common sense go a long way. In order to assess value, licensed land appraisers go through a process of developing a list of comparable properties and then adjusting these “comps” based on their unique or valuable characteristics. Most of the information an appraiser uses is available to the public, so you can find it as well. Spend a little time in the Tax Assessor’s office looking up recent sales. Make a list of desirable characteristics like water, timber, frontage, and topography. Get a feel for raw land value…or the value of the “dirt” alone. Talk to a forester, a land appraiser, or a land lender about values of improvements and natural resources. Meet with the County Tax Appraiser. Ask a lot of questions. Determine market trends. Are land values going up, down, or remaining stable? Evaluate your own comps. In time, you’ll get better and better at estimating value.

But remember, the goal here is not to become an appraiser. The goal is to spot an opportunity…..before someone else can. That’s what investors do.

Get a Buyer’s Agent working for you. They can do several things for you in the land search process that can compliment your efforts. They have access to listed property, either through multi-lists or their relationship with other real estate agents. They also can locate land that is for sale but not listed by any agent. Agents call these properties “pocket” listings. These pocket listings will never be on the internet and are rarely advertised in print ads. You’ll never know about it unless you contact an agent who knows about it, or your agent contacts another agent who knows about it. You might wonder why these pocket listings exist. If the owner wants to sell, so why not tell everybody? Often the owners of rural property don’t want their neighbors to know their property is for sale, until after it is sold. Maybe they just don’t want to hear, ”Why are you selling your land?” Who knows? What matters is that they are selling, and if someone is selling, you want to know about it. Plus, if your agent is out finding listed and pocket listed property, that frees you up to look in other places.

Spend some time riding around.. Actually getting in your car and driving around in an area, while expensive and time consuming, is without a doubt the most enjoyable way to prospect for land. More than once, I have bought land that I found while out driving. And believe it or not, the only method some landowners use to market their land is a sign on a tree.

Shop for Land at the Corner Store. This may sound as an odd place to locate land, but in small towns across America the corner store is still a place where a lot of information passes hands. You never know who knows who in rural America, but you can bet your last dollar that the folks at the local store know every landowner in the area and they know what’s going on in their county. The next time you stop in the country store for a drink or a snack, make a point of talking to people. You never know what could happen.

Spend time in the Courthouse. In most counties, you can purchase an electronic copy of the tax digest from the Tax Assessor. The tax digest contains information about EVERY tract of land in the county, including acreage and landowner name and address. Once you have that information, you can contact landowners by mail and let them know you are interested in purchasing land just like theirs. A lot of counties have this information available online now, so you can get landowner addresses and property information (including maps) without leaving your home.

Networking is the single most important thing you can do. Locating land, more than any other part of the land buying process is a networking endeavor. The goal is to know as many people you can who have some connection to land somewhere. With social networking and email, it has never been easier. So, call your relatives. Twitter your friends. Post it on your Facebook page. Tell everyone you meet. To be successful in locating land, you must build a network, and the more people you tell that you are looking, .the better your chances of having the land find you.

We all have the desire. We all have the ability to dream big dreams that start out, “Someday I’m going to own…..” So, why is it that most people never seem to get past dreaming about land ownership and actually pull the trigger? Is it fear? Is it lack of knowledge? Is it lack of finances? Maybe, but I think the real reason is that most people have a difficult time translating their dreams into concrete actions. They know what they want, but they don’t know how to get it.

I frequently have folks who come to me looking for land, and I try to pry out of them what it is specifically they want to own. They often lament that they wish they had bought the tract they looked at 3 years ago. These folks are looking for a dream tract, but have no idea what one looks like. They can’t translate their subjective dream into objective evaluation criteria. They are hoping for a “eureka” moment. They are waiting for a tract of land to offer an in-person emotional experience that matches the one in their dreams. Well, sometimes that happens, but usually not.

So, how is it that some people figure out how to overcome obstacles and live the dream? Those folks know the secret. They know what seasoned land investors know. The key to getting from dreams to reality is to have an effective plan to get you there. You have to plan to own land. Otherwise, you’ll spend the rest of your life dreaming and miss out on actually living the dream.

Here is my blueprint for a successful land ownership plan.

1. Define EXACTLY what you want and write it down. Include land characteristics like water (creeks, streams, or ponds), timber, road frontage, and topography. Think about things like location. How far is too far? Make sure you are clear on how much land you want. Do you want pasture or timberland? Do you want a ready made play place or do you want a fixer upper where you can go piddle?
2. Be honest with yourself about how much you can afford. Discuss it with your spouse, sibling, parent, or whoever you’re going into this with. Write it down and stick to it.
3. Determine how much time you can spend in the search. Be honest here, as well. You’ll get out of this process exactly what you put into it. You have got to spend time in the field. You are going to get some mud on your boots. You might get lucky and find the tract of your dreams on the first day, but don’t plan on it
4. Be clear about why you want to own land. What is the purpose? How will you use it? Could it change over time? Figure it out, and write it down.
5. Get smart. Allocate some time in your plan to educate yourself on land. Read. Learn. Talk to people who have been successful. The more you know, the more confident you’ll be in any decision you make.

Why go through all of this? Why write it down? The reason is simple. If you can’t write your ownership criteria down, then you don’t complete understand what you want, and it is hard to find something, if you don’t know what you are looking for. A written plan is a control document that will keep you focused on the goal. It is effective in the same way a family budget or a business plan is. It keeps your eyes on the prize. It gives you guidance and evaluation criteria that can snap you back to reality when you get emotionally attracted to a tract of land that is way outside of your budget, or beyond your desired drive time, or lacks the dogwoods and native azaleas you so desperately wanted. A written plan is a commitment to do something. It is the roadmap that will help you turn your dreams into reality.

I believe you need a process to keep you focused on what to do now… and what to do next. Here is the process I follow. It is a proven way to create a profitable and rewarding land ownership experience, and to have fun doing it.

1. Get a Plan: A wise man once said, “Most people want, but most people won’t.” You can’t want your way to a place in the country. You need to put a plan in place to get you there.
2. Know what you want: You can’t find it if you don’t know what you’re looking for. It’s not enough to understand the land, you have to understand yourself. You have to know things like how far is too far, how big is too big, how much can I afford, and what do I want it to look like.
3. Think Like an investor: Everyone is looking for a return on investment, whether that return is measured in dollars, trophies, or memories. Even if you don’t think of yourself as an investor, you need to understand how professional land investors evaluate and analyze property before they buy it.
4. Educate yourself: You must understand the land. It is amazing how many people want to buy land and have no idea the characteristics, the components, the potential, or the value of the land they want to buy. Knowledge is power, and ignorance is expensive.
5. Assemble a team: Buying land is a team sport. You must assemble a team of people to be successful as a land investor. You cannot be an expert in every topic but every topic has an expert and you need to find them and educate yourself on how to use them.
6. Locate the Land: It doesn’t have to be an Easter egg hunt, but you do have to look. There are ways to find land that are obvious and some that are not. The best land deals are not the ones in the real estate flyers or on the internet. You need to know where to look.
7. Evaluate the land: What a piece of land is determines what it could be. Your ability to understand the characteristics, or the “properties” of the property, will determine your success in getting the tract you want.
8. Acquire the land: Financing, negotiation, offers, real estate agents, the whole bit is a complicated process and for most people, it’s a process they have never done before, except for maybe buying a home. The process of acquiring land is not like buying a house, and for most of us it is a once in a lifetime experience.
9. Enjoy the process: Every thing about owning land is fun, so enjoy the process. Both the journey and destination of land ownership are opportunities to have fun, whether it’s spending a day in the woods looking at land or spending a day on your land planting trees. Owning and buying land is fun. Don’t miss it!
10. Share the experience: One of the greatest enjoyments of land ownership for me is the ability to share the land I have with other people. It’s one of the most important parts of land ownership – to share with others. Share the experience.

If you are interested in owning land, think about it and dream about it. But, do something. Hopefully this process will motivate you to get started….to connect the dots between I want some land, and I own some land.

Five years ago, I decided that I wanted to buy some land. I had convinced myself I needed it, but I didn’t know how to approach my wife about it. I’m not sure how it is in your family. In mine, a hunting club membership might be my decision, but a land purchase is a FAMILY decision. One day, out of the blue, I just asked her. ”Honey (I always start out this way when I want something) would you ever want to buy a little place somewhere out in the woods, with a cabin and maybe even a lake?” She didn’t even have to think about it. “No” she snapped, “I can’t even keep this house clean, why would I want another one? And you……you can’t even keep the grass cut at home. How are you going to find time to keep up another place?” Ouch!

Months after that conversation, I came home talking about a little place I had found.

I caught her at a weak moment, and off we went to see it. It was beautiful, and it was peaceful. The cabin was closer to a shack than a lodge, but it did have indoor plumbing which was definitely a plus in my wife’s book. I am not sure how I got her to agree to purchase it. Perhaps it was the fact that we were living in one of the most congested suburbs of Atlanta at the time, and after fighting traffic all week, the chirping of birds sounded a whole lot better than the honking of horns. Even so, she went into this whole land buying process with the idea we were buying my play place; my place to hunt and fish. I don’t believe she ever went into it thinking it was going to be a family retreat or a place she would enjoy.

It’s not that she dislikes the outdoors. She loves it, as long as there is a lounge chair, a beach towel, a small cooler by her side, and a body of water she can wade in when she needs a break from basking in the sun. A condo on the beach would have been more her speed, but you can’t hunt from the balcony of a condo. It also helped my situation that we couldn’t afford the ocean front condo, but that’s another story.

When we were in the process of purchasing our place, I thought the cabin would be what would sell my wife. She saw it as more work. When we walked to the lake, I saw the road as just a way to get to the lake; she looked at it and said, “Oh this is beautiful.” The gazebo didn’t matter to me, but for my wife, it is a cherished place, where she drinks her coffee and reads the newspaper. My wife loves our place in the woods as much as I do, but for different reasons. She enjoys basking in the sun (and yes, she even tries to do that in the pasture). She doesn’t hunt or fish, but she gets as excited as any of us when my son comes back with a catfish, or a deer, or a rabbit, or a squirrel. She goes there to read, to pursue her hobby of photography, to simply do nothing.

For us, owning land was a family decision with family benefits. It is our place to just go knock it in neutral for a while. If you are considering a land purchase, get the whole family involved. You’ll be glad you did. In next week's article, we’ll discuss how you can get started down the road to land ownership.

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I don't think it comes as a surprise to anyone that land is a great investment, but for most people all they hear about land investment is what they hear from some Real Estate GURU with a pitch about how to get rich quick with residential real estate.  All the gurus make it sound so easy.

But do you really want that?

The headaches of buying houses, dealing with contractors in some never ending rehab operation, then trying to find tenants……then dealing with all the problems……broken water pipes…..busted water heaters……clogged toilets.  Do you really want all of this while you work your regular job?  Who’s got the time and patience for that?

Be honest.  Do you get up every morning thinking how great it would be to be a landlord?

Me either.

Well, I’ve got news for you…..The Rockefellers didn’t build their wealth buying dumpy houses in run down neighborhoods.  They built their wealth by buying Jekyll Island.  They bought land…….raw land…….unimproved property…..timberland......land was an investment!

Land Investment . . . yeah, Investment!

Timberland (as an asset class) outperformed the S&P 500 during the big stock market run up from 1987 – 2007?  During that time the only investments that beat timberland were venture capital and private equity.  And because timberland is generally counter-cyclical to the stock market, timberland has held steady while banks, car companies, retail, and the insurance industries have all taken it on the chin.

When you hear about real estate bubble bursting….

Do you ever hear anyone mention land investment, like timberland or hobbyfarms?  Ever wonder why?  I’ll tell you why.  There was never a land bubble and there was never a burst......Only average annual compounded returns of nearly 13%!

Here's something to think about.

In my home state of Georgia, Talbot County is one of the larger counties as measured by area or size.  The population is about 7500 people.  It is very rural with almost no industry.  But 15 years ago you could have invested in land for $400 per acre.  Today, land is going for $3000 per acre.

$20,000 in land investment then….would be worth $150,000 today.  That’s a 650% gain in only 15 years!  In fact, you could have financed it at 9% and made payments of $200 per month.....And STILL recognized a 317% gain.

What’s so special about Talbot County, Georgia?  What's different now?

NOTHING!

And I’ll bet there is a Talbot County in your state, with similar stories from people who took advantage of the land investment opportunity.

So….What’s holding you back?

Here are some additional articles that talk about land as an investment:

• How to Make Money With Rural Properties An Interview with Allen . - The two hottest trends being seen right now are recreational buyers purchasing and developers purchasing. The recreational buyers are purchasing both to hold long term instead of putting money into the stock market, and to reinvest a previous property's proceeds that they've sold. The developers are purchasing because of the demand for country living that has risen and because of cities expanding into rural areas.
• Consider a Land Investment if You're After High Returns | Business ... - The value of land has been soaring over the years thus making it a highly profitable investment alternative. Because land is a finite commodity,
• Field Guide to Land Investment - While land investment may not provide the instant gratification of a home purchase, this sort of venture can be quite lucrative. Land investors have different needs and concerns than those of typical real estate investors - zoning, ...
• » Georgia Species: Wildlife Photography Georgia Country Blog: All ... - Here at at Georgia Country we are a blog devoted to land and land ownership. Any good outdoorsman must be familiar with the species indigenous to their area. In that regard we here at Georgia Country work hard to try to catalog the various species in our region.
• Should Timber Investments Be Part of Your Portfolio by Grant Glessing - Timber and timberland have traditionally been investment vehicles for institutional investors because of the amount of capital required. There are however, excellent opportunities in today's timber and timberland investment marketplace ...
• Invest to beat inflation | Alternative Haven - How to beat inflation in the long run? Historically, there are 2 main ways to beat inflation: precious metals like Gold and Silver and for those who can afford.