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njbuilding143

Sloped Land.. What are the options..

njbuilding143
9 years ago

Ok... So we are in the beginning stages of the house.. Plans are drawn up.. Bids are being placed together and I am currently have an engineered site plan drawn up.. The land is a sloped piece of property.. It was given to us by family as an early wedding gift.. The problem we are seeing is the back left corner of the property comes up and forms a small hill in the rear of the property.. I never noticed how high it was but the topography shows that it is at 108 while the front of the property ranges from 99 to 103.. The engineer gave an update that they are working on the retaining walls for the sides of the house and their preliminary drawings are showing that we would have to curve the wall along the left side of the property and have it come out into the center of the yard.. I told him we were planning for a pool so he is reworking the layout.. My question is .. What are my options.. Is there any way to have a level yard with this property? Or is it going to cost more then its worth? I am including pictures of the property and in two of the photos you can see a retaining wall that separates our property from the neighbors on the left.. I have been told that this was put up by the previous owner and was not professionally done.. On multiple occassions the wall w/ fence have come down during heavy rain.. I plan to have the wall redone but not doing anything until we figure out what to do.. I mentioned leveling the property and the engineer commented that I would be looking at having to have an engineered wall put up and it would have to be poured concrete and I should expect 6ft or higher.. Not sure what my options are here..

Comments (9)

  • Annie Deighnaugh
    9 years ago

    Is there a way to terrace it so the slope is more gradual and it won't have to come out so far?

  • live_wire_oak
    9 years ago

    Unfortunately, the property doesn't suit the aspirations of a budget build. Just replacing the POS existing wall is going to be a pretty expensive but totally necessary expense. Then the home's foundation itself has to account for the slope.

    I'd take care of replacing the existing wall right now, and then maybe put off the build for another year while the budget recovered from that hit and you could save enough to deal with the rest of the problem.

  • musicgal
    9 years ago

    Yep, that wall is the most important element to think about right now and deserves thorough vetting and investigation of potential contractors. As it is, it looks like a lawsuit ready to happen if someone should get hurt when the fence collapses the next time.

    We installed many engineered, reinforced walls on our sloped property. They are not cheap... but if they are done correctly they provide a lot of peace of mind. For you guys, it all depends on how much you want to spend right now.

  • njbuilding143
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Well the issue with the wall is that I have been trying to determine who is actually responsible for it.. It also supports the fence which is technically a shared fence between the two properties.. The wall is on my property, however as stated it was done when the neighbor wanted to replace the fence that is on their property so perhaps there will be some shared cost for this, but again I have to speak with the neighbors in regards to that.. Hopefully we can get a better idea once the engineer takes a look at the property.. He is working on the site plan and said he would be on the property this week to get a better look of the layout and where things are situated.. From what I have reading it looks like to replace that wall will be somewhere in the range of 5-8k... I am just hoping that perhaps if we are going to replace it anyway the cost will not just be a waste but will also help us to get the property the way we want it..

  • dekeoboe
    9 years ago

    Have you been on the property during a rainstorm? How does the water flow through the lot?

  • njbuilding143
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    We have seen the property during heavy rain.. The rain water all seems to come from the right side of the property and runs along the right side of the property..

  • pixie_lou
    9 years ago

    You said this land was given to you by family. So either your family put the wall and fence up, your neighbor put it up, or it was there when your family acquired the property. I'm guessing your neighbor out it up, so then the question is - was it put up with or without your family so permission? Express or impied?

    As others have said, that fence looks like an accident waiting to happen. So your first course of action is to figure put who is responsible for the fence and get it rectified.

  • live_wire_oak
    9 years ago

    That's no 8K fence fix. That would be for a fence only. Add a retaining wall to the mix that has to be designed by a professional and permitted, and you more than doubled the price and complexity. Maybe even tripled, depending on your location and the permit costs.

  • pprioroh
    9 years ago

    Are you really saying that that -FENCE- falls down on multiple occasions????

    If so, WOW, that is a huge liability risk as that looks like quite a large and heavy fence.

    The neighbor built a wall and a fence on your property? Or on theirs?