Washington State Eminent Domain | Severance Damages Explained

In last few posts I've discussed several different issues regarding Washington State eminent domain and how landowners can get more money for their property taken by eminent domain. The key thing to remember is that condemning authorities have someone on their side working for them, and you should too. Eminent domain is complicated, and you need a trusted ally.

Let me give you an example of how complicated the Washington State eminent domain process can be (and how much help having someone working for you can pay off). There was a family, let's call them the Smiths, who where having their property taken by eminent domain, in, for purposes of example only, Seattle. Now, this property didn't sit in Seattle proper, but right on the outskirts. The property consisted of 40 acres, rectangular in shape, and was used for agricultural purposes. The west property line adjoined the property line of the current highway 99 just as it left Seattle (remember this is hypothetical).

At some point the city of Seattle decided it needed to re-align highway 99 so that it no longer had any stop lights or stop signs. The only way to get on and off after this realignment was finished would be with on and off ramps - more like an expressway than a state highway. To do this Seattle went around and through a neighborhood where the design engineers decided it best fit. This ended up putting the new highway right through the middle of the Smith's property (called a severance in eminent domain speak), leaving 12 acres on one side and 14 on the other.

Although the Smith's were devastated that the new highway alignment went right through their property and that their Seattle land would be taken by eminent domain if they didn't settle, they were confident the city would make them a good offer for their property, including the loss in value to the property they would have left, since once the new highway was built it would be very hard to continue farming the land (remember there is no way to get across the highway from one part of the property to the other).

Normally appraisers don't have to account for the loss in value to any remaining property, much less one that has been cut in half. Traditionally they are tasked with determining the fair market value of the property to be taken. This means figuring out what a willing buyer and a willing seller in an open and competitive market would pay for the property. But in this case it is more complicated because of the severance.

In my experience, the way the property should be valued is to look at what the entire property would have been worth before the eminent domain taking, and then look at what the property remaining after the eminent domain taking, subtract the two, and learn your amount of just compensation (called a before and after analysis). But all too often appraisers will approach determining the value of the property after the taking by assuming the property owner would sell of the property to two different owners - one on one side of the new road and one on the other. And that may well be the case, but the appraiser is supposed to assume the property would be sold to one person. If you think about it this makes the property remaining much more valuable than if the Smiths had to sell their severed property to one owner (remember there is no way to get across the road from one property to another).

In my hypothetical, this is exactly what happened to the Smiths. The appraiser overvalued the remaining property, extremely lowering Seattle's offer of just compensation (the appraiser found ZERO damages to the remainder property). When the Smiths saw the offer from the city, they knew it was far too low. They knew the property they had left would be worthless. So they did what any prudent landowner should - they got help with their eminent domain taking. And what was the result? A substantially increased settlement of just compensation, with their property valued the way it was supposed to have been at the very beginning.