It can take years for a Tennessee resident to locate the right piece of land on which to build their home or business. After carefully assessing parcel after parcel, an individual may finally come across the perfect spot on which to build. Before they sign on the dotted line and purchase the tract that they believe will become the home to their real estate dream, they should first ensure that the parcel is zoned appropriately for their intended use.
Zoning is the practice of assigning appropriate uses to different areas of land. For example, a city may zone outlying areas for industrial and agricultural use while zoning city centered areas for residential and commercial uses. The idea behind zoning is that similarly used tracts will be located near each other and therefore be less likely to affect each other’s usages.
Readers are asked to imagine a community where anyone could build any type of structure or business wherever they wanted. A residential home may be located next door to a manufacturing facility that operates around the clock. The home owner may become frustrated with the noise and lights of the factory at night but in such a situation may be helpless to do anything about it.
Zoning is intended to make properties more useful by assigning them appropriate usages based on where they are located. This can mean, however, that a person may have to continue their search if they discover that their perfect parcel is not zoned for the type of use that they have envisioned. Real estate attorneys can help their clients work through zoning issues and to find workable solutions to their real property needs.