GIS and Land Acquisition

Jon Adams, Geographic Information System Manager has spent the better part of the last 3 years teaching builders and developers about Business Geography using Geography Information Systems. While the big builders have full time staff planners and GIS persons, small businesses lack these assets. How does the small builder compete with the big boys? Adams says GIS can be used at the both the macro and micro level. At the micro level it can help evaluate individual projects, using data layers obtained from various levels of government. Using these data layers combined with census data, Jon can tell a client more about a parcel of land in half an hour than a client with three weeks of research can determine. Through GIS analysis Jon can point out changes in demographics, take home salaries and per-square foot revenue, giving indications of ROI from census data and identify transportation problems, zoning issues or environmental issues. Using GIS analysis a developer can build a business case to present to financial backers, builders, planners and government agencies.

Taking GIS analysis to the regional planning level, GIS analysis can spot regional trends including infrastructure plans, land use changes and special planning districts which reveal long range opportunities which are not apparent at the local level. A small developer can identify key properties, tie them up with a land contract, get the appropriate land use and zoning, then sell them to the big guys at a considerable profit.

This proactive approach can increase the bottom line.

A Geographic Information System consists of specialized datasets and software and requires a trained technician with a strong background in cartography. GIS can create maps that organize geographic information in layers such as:

• Zoning and cadastral information
• Soils, ground cover and wildlife habitat
• Watersheds, wetlands and flood zones
• Topography and hydrology
• Land pricing levels, entitlements and supply of permitted sites
• Average sales prices and volumes
• Market distance decay for locating retail businesses

Many builders use market consultant that have access to GIS, who track sales data and product coming into the market, but you really need the services of a geographer who is trained to spot the interrelationships between physical features of the environment and the regulatory environment that governs them. While large builders can afford the GIS hardware, software and professional staff, small builders are smarter to outsource their GIS needs

Over the past year Jon has been able to help homebuilders with the following questions:

• Where are local inventory levels expected to be higher or lower than the market average
• What areas and products are likely to experience the greatest level of appreciation and/or to be most resilient when the market turns
• Given the planned extension of municipal utilities or road development, where new projects are likely to emerge, and what effect could they have on various areas?

The GIS department has also been busy developing maps and data to support the Expert Testimony of Michael Joachim.

GIS is a decision support system for “where should I build next” decisions. Using the previously mentioned analysis, a business geographer can forecast future development and pricing patterns. Forecasting trends with GIS requires significant historic information and complex spatial regression techniques. However the GIS based forecasts can account for zoning and environmental constraints at a very detailed resolution. This can avoid the inherent risks in “Build it and they will come” decisions.

Inevitably nearly all decisions that have anything to do with location will eventually use GIS technology; just as financial analysis already relies on spreadsheet technology.

Trained Business Geographers are becoming as common at the offices of major builders as MBAs. By taking advantage of the increased amount of information in a GIS-compatible format, business geographers will bring insights from regional economic analysis to specific decisions facing homebuilders and developers