another Land question, very long one

[Figen M.]

Hi everyone:

We bought a land 2.5 years ago in Somerset New Jersey.It is located in a close proximity to major highways. Next door neighbours are mostly small corporations. There are beautiful developments townhouses and 55+ senior complex only a block away. There are newly developed shopping center Shop Rite, Cvs and strip mall again 1-2 block away. Our lot faces two street. from east and west. It is zoned as "light industrial".

We bought as foreclosure. It had been on the market for awhile.
( I know you must be saying , didn't this tell you something). The problem was that, there was a little stream in the lot, We said that " ok, if we buy the lot and endure the DEP and all thats stuff and then we have a good deal." Yes we endured all, it took whole year of patience, disbelief (to how DEP works) and many many phones calls, e-mails, surveys this and that with DEP and we finally had LOI insummer of 2008 (not a good time try to sell a lot right?).

Our lot is 6 acres, but the stream divides the lot kind of almost half. With the buffers from the stream etc., the usable part is total of 3.5 acres. As a matter of fact, township is looking for the subdivision of our lot positivley. So if it is subdivided, one part is 1 acre of usable area and the other side is 2.5 acres. Township mentoned that it will be good to build something commercial in the small side and they kind of support that and would might change the zoning to commercial for that side.
So everything might look good so far.

We contacted almost every businesses around us, because some of them have parking problems and they had already been parking their cars. (after we bought the lot we put a chain to prevent the access to our lot), we didin't get any response. One of our neighbors in fact made an informal offer (i wish we did accept), it was too low (we were not greedy it was really too low).Then we listed the lot before we got the LOI by saying that LOI is pending. We listed with a commercial realtor (although we are also realtors, we thoguht it would be good to list with a commercial company.) All these were happening in Fall of 2007,
I am not going over the problems created by the realtor. Anyway we had an offer we started to negotiate. But whatever we decide and accept he ended up coming with another demand, we literally had no choice, we all wanted to sell it so we ended up saying yes to many of his demands. We had the LOI in July 2008 and actively market the lot but it was when the mortgage melt down was happening, nobody was thinking of doing anything.

The same buyer keep coming back because "it is really good for his business" but we just doesn't want to deal with him anymore and now he "really" started have problem with bank to get a loan.

This is a story that many people might had, that one bad deal that ruin your life. This thought me so many thinks including trust my judgement no matter what other people says. I never think to buy a lot for investors like us a good idea other than tying the money to something that might take years to sell.

The taxes are $15000 and the lot is assessed $771000, we can't even sell $400000. Last year they revaluated and reduce to $13,400 and we wanted to appeal again and they told us, they just reduced it so they will not probably reduce again. We told them if you think this lot worth $771000, we can sell to the township $400000 :)))

We are not big investors or developers. If this was anything to do with residential real estate, that wouldn't be a problem, we have experience we might knwo what to do. We definitely made a mistake, we can not afford to do anything by ourselves. If i have money and experience, this lot would be a very good investment. i would subdivide, put WaWa or QuickCheck to one side and I build a flex space to the otherside. But we can't do it and in this economy nobody wants to do anything also

I am sorry this is too long, there are so many things that i can write about this lot (ruining my life and joy). We never planned an exit strategy, which was a huge mistake.Especially experienced investor, do you have any suggestions what should we do?

Thanks in advance
Figen