Cost's of owning land?

[donlou]

Evening all,

We have only been in this lovely country for 6 weeks now but we have our eye on a plot of land we may wish to purchase. Before we take the leap we want to confirm what the costs will be. We can afford to buy the land outright however am I correct in that we pay stamp duty on the land also? Also are there any additional costs as we will not be in a position to actually build on the land for a while. Any advice/answers greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

[spanners]

Council rates (at a reduced rate if no building exists or unoccupied), liability insurance and the biggest con - SA Water. I have some land that did not have nor ever have water or a water meter but because water mains ran below the road (or rather that the land had road access and that road had water beneath it) SA Water could charge me $ 80 odd per 1/4. You are also required to cut a fire barrier 3 metres wide along all fence lines which effectually means just keeping the grass short along all the boundaries. Other than that, nothing.

[NicF]

I can't remember about stamp duty, but we owned a block of land for about a year before building started. We had to pay council rates and water charges, although obviously there was no water usage. I'm not sure how you go if there is no existing water service on the block though - you might not have to pay in that case. Our block was from an existing house that had been demolished and the land subdivided and our side had the existing water meter on it so we had to pay the water charges. Don't think we had any other costs associated with owning the land other than mortgage payments, but that won't be an issue for you if you don't need a mortgage to buy.

[Guest Claire-n-tel]

Yep you have to pay stamp duty

[Guest BurgessFamily]

If you are considering building... is the land level?... what are the soil reports, is there clay/rocks? etc.... they could add a lot of cost when building.

[spanners]

With regards to rock - that can blow out all budgets. If its a rural block then just walk around it with the agent. If its metro then ask the house owners either side what issues they had with their build. Some luck is involved - i have just build on a 10 acre hilly block in the Barossa. Rock everywhere but didn't hit anything major with the foundations or laying the pipework / road 300metres up the hill. Not all rock is a problem - up here the red course rock breaks quite easily but the blue stone is rock (!!) hard and a bugger to contend with.