We recommend that we engage a licensed valuer (with compensation experience and expertise) as soon as you have been notified by the acquiring authority that your land is required for the purposes of a public work. This is because land compensation is a highly specialised and complex area of valuation practice.
A land valuer will ask you to provide them with any correspondence or documentation you have received from the acquiring authority.
The valuer will investigate the condition of the property, the likely impacts of the public work, and examine the sales of comparable properties. The valuer will investigate not only the current permissible uses of the property, but also the potential of the property for rezoning to higher order uses. The valuer will also assess how the proposed public work will impact the current permissible uses and any future potential your property has.
The valuer must disregard the impacts of the public work on the land taken (including prior related planning that may diminish the true land value) and value the land according to its highest and best potential. The valuer is to determine the “unaffected” value of the land on an impartial market value basis, applying comparable sales or other valuation methodologies which the valuer selects according to their professional judgment.
The valuer is to assess the following heads of compensation (apart from the value of land acquired):
