I have a home that I’ve lived in for 13 years, as a
single family home. Before I purchased it, the
upstairs and downstairs were rented out separately
with two electric meters, and one gas meter. Current
fair market value on the home is $158K. If it were
sold as a duplex (with a few upgrades < $5K), it would
sell for about $195K.
Recently, a very large business (which is on the
backside of my property, so its front side is on a
major street on prime commercial property), purchased
the two homes next to me on my street. Both of those
smaller homes are back-to-back with this business.
The business now wants to purchase my home, but
expects that they don’t have to pay me fair market
value. Three of the offers they’ve mentioned have
been ridiculously low enough that, if accepted, I
couldn’t even purchase a similiar home in the same
area.
This business has been hounding me to sell, and I had
to enlist an agent to help out. Now, I have to pay
her commission upon the sale, and that could have been
avoided. Here are additional conditions:
-The business that wants my property also says they
are going to tear the homes down and have the property
rezoned to light commercial so they can use it as a
parking lot. I have to wonder how much ROI they can
get by using the property as a parking lot since these
are small pieces of property.
-The city has declared the area around our street
blighted for commercial redevelopment (about 1/2 mile
radius).
-The city announced last summer during a town meeting
that they plan to make a throughway street to connect
to a current T-intersection (also part of the blight
study). The intersection that connects the existing
main road is–also prime commercial. The options that
the city propsed were 1) opening up my street from a
cul de sac to adjoin and connect the current
T-intersection. Doing this would also make property
on my street, when rezoned from residential to
commercial, high profile. 2) Connect a residential
street one block west of me, and two blocks west of
the T-intersection. More homes would be affected with
this option. 3) Connect a street four blocks west
that has some cottage businesses and a couple of
homes, and is closer to the interstate entrance that
it is to the T-intersection. This seems like the
least likely option.
-The city responded to my GRAMA request saying that no
decision has yet been made on which of the three
options they have chosen as the through street.
-The person contacting me from the business has a
neighbor on the city’s planning and zoning committee,
who is also good friends with out city’s mayor. (My
source is reliable).
Here are options I’m considersing:
-Hold out, and continue living on the property, which
will be right next to the business after they tear the
existing homes down. Have my home rezoned to
commercial and try to resell it regardless of what the
city decides to do with the through street options.
-Hold out, spend the money I’d have to pay in a
commission to fix my home up for duplex rental, rent
and move.
-Tell my story to an investor and see if he/she would be interested.
-Sell to the business, knowing that I may be ‘giving’
away prime commercial property, or knowing my home is
worth much more with its fair market value.
Any tips and/or advice will be considered. Thanks for
your input.