Land easement and my options

[Ziv Fishfedder]

What can i do if a city where i own a property, announced they need a part of my land for a community project, and i can either 'donate' the land or get a 'just compensation' ?

[Matt Devincenzo]

Get your own third party independent appraisal...the City should also be providing you with one to justify their value but theirs will achieve their goal which is to minimize the project cost. Based upon how that goes engage your own land use attorney that has experience in 'eminent domain' and 'condemnation'.

I have a client who owns apartments along the limits of a new trolley line being installed in SD. They were given an appraisal showing the property value being taken was 1.3M...but the anticipated value of the trolley being added would benefit them to the tune of 1M...reducing the compensation value to only 300K. I don't know what the final compensation was since they have their attorney ect working on that, but the point is they were offered 25% of the value the City had already determined because of some creative accounting. Maybe the City's approach is valid, maybe it's not, but I can assure you the City will try to minimize their exposure here...just like asking you to donate the easement...that's in their interest not yours.