Have a 70 acre piece of property off the Brazos River, west of 47, that we are looking at selling off a 2-3, 11 acre plots. Chose 11 acres as that would allow buyers to keep Ag and build.

Question I have is the 11 acre size appropriate for most folks wanting a bit of space?

Bill Robbins said:

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11 acres is a good size. My biggest concern would be the flood risk.

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Agreed on both. And not even as much as the actual risk as the flood map. So much of the stuff along the river is marked flood plain but will never actually flood.

CS78 said:

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Bill Robbins said:

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11 acres is a good size. My biggest concern would be the flood risk.

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Agreed on both. And not even as much as the actual risk as the flood map. So much of the stuff along the river is marked flood plain but will never actually flood.

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Flood plain maps are marked for 0.2%-1% of annual chance to flood. Meaning 100 years go by, you can expect the flood to happen at least 1 time.

They will absolutely flood, just hard to say when. Just makes whatever you build have to be a bit higher and reasonably sloped to mitigate the impact it has for you.

Red Pear Luke (BCS) said:

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CS78 said:

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Bill Robbins said:

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11 acres is a good size. My biggest concern would be the flood risk.

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Agreed on both. And not even as much as the actual risk as the flood map. So much of the stuff along the river is marked flood plain but will never actually flood.

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Flood plain maps are marked for 0.2%-1% of annual chance to flood. Meaning 100 years go by, you can expect the flood to happen at least 1 time.

They will absolutely flood, just hard to say when. Just makes whatever you build have to be a bit higher and reasonably sloped to mitigate the impact it has for you.

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My opinion, there is stuff that is marked to flood that won't. Have property on the Brazos side of the river in the flood plain. Ive actually traveled up and down the river when it was up over 50ft in 2016 and I dont think it will ever get high enough to inundate the FEMA map. From eyeing my property versus the water level at the time, I suspect they are using the 1913 flood as their benchmark. Since 1913, there's been a bunch of lakes and dams built to slow the downstream release of flood waters. Another 1913 rain event should not produce the same flooding that it did. Obviously, records are sometimes broken though.

Flood, property is flood zone A and I called county flood district to see what elevation structures required. House pad will need to be approximately 5-6ft (total elevation of 236ft)t so we will be digging ponds prior to any construction. What I've seen is you need to have house above flood plain to get decent priced flood insurance required for mortgage.

Thank you again to all for comments, wanted to do a quick check prior to surveying etc. Lot's should be up for sale in a few months.

Make sure to research septic requirements too. Seems like I remember 2ft above flood. Might be remembering wrong.

And congrats on what should be a successful endeavor.

thegoodag said:

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Flood, property is flood zone A and I called county flood district to see what elevation structures required. House pad will need to be approximately 5-6ft (total elevation of 236ft)t so we will be digging ponds prior to any construction. What I've seen is you need to have house above flood plain to get decent priced flood insurance required for mortgage.

Thank you again to all for comments, wanted to do a quick check prior to surveying etc. Lot's should be up for sale in a few months.

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This is all true. You will need to prove that the ground floor/living area is above the Base Flood Elevation levels. Then you can get a surveyor to come out and reshoot and provide an elevation certificate showing property living area is above the BFE. Which should help for insurance somewhat, but I can't speak to specifics because my experience in this area is related to insurance for business interruption insurance on commercial properties.

But this is a very common issue with manufactured housing communities and I know lots of operators will try to get elevation certs for insurance purposes.

Jay@AgsReward.com said:

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I have no idea of your specifics and you may very well be correct that your land would be high and dry, but those FEMA flood maps are redrawn every 10-25 years taking into account the new reality of development. so, very little chance that they are still using a map from 1913.

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Jay is correct here. My best example of this is properties in Houston being redrawn into flood zones as a result of Hurricane Harvey and they ended up flooding. FEMA got around to redrawing the flood maps from that event and it has been a Charlie Foxtrot for those property owners needing to now get flood insurance, even if they never needed it before.

Am interested in more about these 11 acre lots on Leonard Rd too as we have moved back to Aggieland and been searching for several months. We have looked at property down Leonard a year ago (should have bought it) and am curious where yours is located and what you anticipate listing them for?
Are they 100% in flood plain or just part of them?

https://www.land.com/api/documents/5214024595/AERIALMAP_TRACTS1-6.pdf

Pretty sure this is the property mentioned.

I have not listed property yet, those 6 are around the corner so to speak. Here is a link to our piece.

https://www.compass.com/listing/tbd-leonard-road-bryan-tx-77807/1151411059708456121/

thegoodag - I know exactly where that piece is and remember looking at that parcel thinking we could sell some off and keep some for ourselves. But, so much of it is in the flood plain and we didn't want to deal with that. (The one we SHOULD have bought on Leonard Rd a year ago is very close.)
Will keep my eyes out when they list. Best of luck to you!

Reguarljoe,
Am aware of those newly divided lots, but they are on Jones Rd.

Yes in flood plain. Likelihood of flood pretty rare as red pare Luke stated but possible. Need to dig a bass/ catfish pond and use material to build pad for house. This is the normal way of doing things down here on coast. Down here I don't know if I'd buy a place in country that did not have an elevated house pad.

Price point will reflect cost of building pad and the once every 100 yr flood.

Waiting on Bryan utilities to bring 3 phase power to site in next few months before listing.