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Soulman2005
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 08:41am
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Hello, thinking of purchasing 100 acre lot in the Huntsville area Of Ontario. The property has a partially completed 600 sq foot cabin. Thought the cabin was built very well, I don’t think he had permits to build it. Wondering what route to take with the township in order to complete work and keep the cabin. Property is zoned RU meaning seasonal recreation only. Any advice appreciated.
Thx
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FishHog
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 09:12am
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call the township office and discuss it with them. Its the only way you will get the right answer.
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ICC
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 09:14am - Edited by: ICC
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You are just buying what is there. You have done no wrong from the townships point of view. But if you do not ask the township and complete work on a cabin with no permit, you may be doing "wrong". So ask the township what the status is, what you need to do to complete the cabin. Take pictures so they can see what is there.
EDIT..... ask BEFORE you buy. There may be costs to be paid because there was no permit and if so those should be taken into account when finalizing the sale.
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Alaskajohn
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 10:38am
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I agree with what ICC said about clearing this up before the sale.
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Soulman2005
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 11:30am
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Thanks, I have negotiated the price to reflect the cabin situation, basically valued it at zero. I think the price I’d be acquiring the land for is at or below market value. Didn’t want to talk to the building department as a few of the adjoining properties also have non permitted structures and I didn’t want the town to start poking around the area. I suppose I could ask in hypotheticals..
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 12:38pm
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Why dont you ask for all the info the town has on the property including any outstanding or expired permits?
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FishHog
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 02:58pm
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If you want to keep the structure, do it right. You won't get away with unpermitted stuff in the Huntsville area for long.
Your neighbours buildings should not be a reason for you to potentially cause yourself some serious headaches in the future when you get caught. It is only a when in that area, they are looking for that stuff.
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ICC
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 03:15pm - Edited by: ICC
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Quoting: Soulman2005 Didn’t want to talk to the building department as a few of the adjoining properties also have non permitted structures and I didn’t want the town to start poking around the area.
Doesn't make sense to me, to think that way unless you are intending to disregard getting any permits yourself and building whatever you want "under the radar"
If you are intending to build according to the existing rules and obtain whatever permits are required, that comes along with inspections at several stages. That means the town's inspectors will be "poking around" the neighborhood. At that point, you would be 100% in the right way of doing things. If somebody else gets caught with some un-permitted work, that is not really your fault. The fault would lay with whoever skipped the permit.
Where I am some of the "gotcha's" that happen with un-permitted work comes from complaints from a third party, sometimes a neighbor who has an issue with something. The balance of the "gotcha's" comes from inspectors doing their job on some job site that has a permit and noticing something new along the way. Sometimes they may do nothing about it, sometimes they need to hit a slow day before they stop by. My area has one inspector that does almost all the inspections. He pretty much knows who has a permit and who doesn't.
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Steve_S
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 05:18pm - Edited by: Steve_S
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Quoting: FishHog If you want to keep the structure, do it right. You won't get away with unpermitted stuff in the Huntsville area for long. Your neighbours buildings should not be a reason for you to potentially cause yourself some serious headaches in the future when you get caught. It is only a when in that area, they are looking for that stuff.
Words of Wisdom !
Past 3 years they are doing Arial Building Survey's for tax purposes and they are finding lot's of things.
I'm reasonably local to Hunstville. Building depts up here are better than near urbanity but tick em off... just don't. They prefer people asking questions about possibilities, options etc hypothetically, if you want to build something. That makes their lives much less complicated too, which they like a LOT ! Calm, cool, casual, relaxed and very patient goes a long way with the country boy inspectors... shhh... I did not write that out loud OK.
Lessons Learned Dept.
Designations are tricky, can hit the taxes too...
Each county has odd little peculiar requirements, I ran into that variety before I bought my land up here. Some quite inconvenient like "must have septic" or Minimum 750 square feet" even for a"camp". Hunstville is pretty cool, but has it's own "quirks".
About Designation. You'll love this. I am on a Year Round Recreational & Hunt Camp. composting toilet, grey water system, frost protected slab with radiant and 280 sq foot footprint. I live here.
100 Acres you certainly can use the "hunt camp" or a general recreational and more of course. The existing cabin may also be a grandfathered in thing in part depending on when it was first put up. I don't recall when but it wasn't that long ago, that was run more like an unorganised township... talking decades not yrs. You should be able to find that out too. There may also be something on the survey map if any structures have existed there. You should have gotten a copy with the paperwork, if not you can get a copy at the township office.
There are a heap load of legacy buildings around, so no panic required. If by chance you say something like, "someone built a cabin on there and I wanna know if it's legal" - bad idea. LMAO gentle & subtle inquiry. Partly I say this, because someone I know personally got a bit too hyper with finding a building on his new land, well there was more, it had been a grow op farm... well, lot's of demolition and other nasty things came about. Most of it could have been avoided with calm, cool & collected.
A building on Skids (not a permanent structure) is never a problem to put on a site, lot of local Amish build them and are a great value, just drop it in place with a bit of prep and finish. Build your own and keep it with "technically" moveable size and not permanently anchored.
Hope it helps and maybe provided a chuckle or two as well.
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Soulman2005
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 05:26pm
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Thanks for the advice! I guess as long as seller acknowledges cabin existence in the purchase agreement, I should be fine to ask the town for permits to continue. Worst case I’ll have to tear down, will still have the land and be able to start fresh through proper channels.
Thanks all!
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 07:22pm
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That's not how it works. The town may know at the point of sale but will be could be issuing violations after that.
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gcrank1
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 07:44pm - Edited by: gcrank1
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Fwiw, as an example only....'fer instance' and not in your area at all:
We bought this year a 9+ ac piece of land c/w a rough offgrid, dry 'hunting' cabin' built 2012. The township was kinda lax back then and it seems he may have done it unpermited...But (key to me) it has been listed as 'improvements' on the tax bill and accessed so the powers that be have known about it and taxed it for years.
You may want to find out how it is all listed on the property rolls there before asking questions; ie, find out what they 'know' and go from there.
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 12 Dec 2020 07:56pm
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That's not how it works. The town may know at the point of sale but will be could be issuing violations after that.
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silverwaterlady
Member
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# Posted: 13 Dec 2020 01:17pm - Edited by: silverwaterlady
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Here is our experience with the above:
Even in unincorporated townships in Ontario aerial photographs have been taken before leaf cover took over in the spring. Just about the time the snowmelt ended.
Got a great new photo of our property and cabin (did not need to worry about not being legal because we did it legal by doing everything by the book).
A few townships got together did it/paid for it to crack down on travel trailers being lived in/stored and abandoned vehicles being stored on properties.
Giving landowners a reasonable amount of time to remove via a disclaimer in the local newspaper. After that a letter sent and 30 days to comply. After that hefty fines.
The days of getting away with unpermitted structures anywhere is coming to a close.
I would ask the township before purchase. If it’s negative I would think about how much money I would have to come up with to either bring it up to code, tear it down because it’s so bad it can’t be bought up to code and how much it’s going to cost to get rid of the debris and start over. Sounds like a big headache to me.
Asking before purchase won’t cost you anything that’s what I would do.
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Soulman2005
Member
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# Posted: 13 Dec 2020 01:40pm
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I have contacted the chief building inspector from the region. His recommendation was to have my lawyer obtain a property compliance report before purchase. If no permits exist, I can prepare “as built†drawings to submit with building permit application. Which would allow them to assist in bringing the cabin into compliance.
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Steve_S
Member
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# Posted: 14 Dec 2020 04:19am
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Quoting: Soulman2005 If no permits exist, I can prepare “as built†drawings to submit with building permit application. Which would allow them to assist in bringing the cabin into compliance.
This is done quite a bit, largely to address legacy buildings and can indeed work to your advantage.
In Ontario, a homeowner can design, do the drawings and submit that to a building department if doing a self-build. If you hire a company to build it, they have to do the long deal of blueprints and all of that extra work for compliances.
I designed my own home, and generated Blueprints. But I also own a Professional version of Chief Architrect (Yes I dropped the big coin on the software). They will accept hand drawn plans BUT the details still all have to be there, a quick doodle on the back of an envelope won't do.
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 14 Dec 2020 08:47am
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Another free question to ask is if the town requires a engineer stamped drawing. If so and you alreaty have a half build building you may be in for a long and expensive process.
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