Looking at the tax card for the property in question indicates that almost all the value is in the land, $74K for the buildings The total assessed value has been declining for the last three years in a market that is growing. It appears the current owner paid $520K in 2007 just before the RE market crashed, along with the rest of the economy. She put the property into a new trust less than a year ago. I'm not a tax person, but I wonder if the new trust allows a better tax deal for taking a loss on the sale of the property?
For the septic discussion. A non-compliant system is "grandfathered" until it fa-fails, then it has to be brought up to code. Banks have different approaches to this. DES will allow some exceptions in the new design/build so that somebody isn't thrown out of their home. Some RE Agents do not cross check, but sometimes a seller will insist that a home be listed as 3 BR or some other feature. When the house is appraised for a mortgage, the appraiser will definitely check BR with Septic design. And the RE Agent can tell the seller "I told you so." If they don't match, the bank will not write the loan or will perhaps require new system upgrades as part of the deal.
If you go back a couple of sales, you'll see that GEM Realty Trust was an owner, looks like twice.. If you Google GEW Realty Trust, you get:
GEM Realty Trust v. First N/B, Boston CV-93-606-SD 05/18/95
http://www.nhd.uscourts.gov/sites/de...95/95SD044.pdf
Verrry interesting...