Anyone have experience w/ process of legally separating a duplex

[Jian G.]

Hi I am aware the process of doing such varies from city to city. I am in the city of san diego and have spoken to the city, they told me to talk to my realtor the sold us the duplexes and but my realtor is not sure. each property is recorded as one piece which means it cannot be sold as two separate pieces of property. however they do have its own house number. One of the Duplex share a wall and its mirror image on both side, and the other one they are detach. the employees at the city do not understand variances and lot division. my realtor recommend me to go talk to the county recorder or city planning.  does anyone here know the process and can shine me some light. I have 2 duplexes i would like to remodel, do additions and sell them all individually. 

[Matt Devincenzo]

Jian, I do this sort of work in the City of San Diego. If you want to send me info I can tell you what it is you need to do vs what you think you need to do. i.e. if you have legal parcels (legal and tax parcels are NOT necessarily the same), you can segregate them at the assessors office and sell separately with very little work required.

If you need to do a TPM or TPM waiver, then you can create separate legal lots or condos and sell separately. 

Also your plumbing questions, you may need a ROW permit to do separate taps...the tap itself is done by the City but you need a class A contractor to do the field work. But you are probably better off doing private submeters because the City and CWA fees for a new meter will be at a minimum $7,500...that doesn't include permit, engineering or contractor charges.

For what it is worth the DSD staff does not understand land use planning generally (some do). They are nearly always going to tell you you need everything because that is the 'safe' answer. Bring it all to today's standards and we know it is right vs just what needs to be done to accomplish your goal.