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Wind Power

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BlackLabs

Sophomore Member
Joined
Jul 17, 2006
Professional Status
Certified Residential Appraiser
State
Massachusetts
I was recently contacted by a citizens group from my town. They are interested in how their properties will be affected by a proposed 400 foot wind turbine. They are certain this will have a negative impact on their property value. I have tried to research this by Googling but have spent an hour following lousy links. Would anyone have some experience, links or advice on where I can start to look? This is a small seaside community near Cape COD, MA.

Thanks,

Paul
 
Wow. Sounds like that is going to be a great assignment. I'm not joking.

I have no experience in such an assignment. But this is how I would approach it:

First, because of the lack of information from your typical research tools you're going to have to find a community with wind turbines and employ another appraiser from that area so the two of you can compare notes. I don't see anyway around this unless you have direct access to such information. So be prepared to explain this to your clients. Once you've found another appraiser it should be a piece of cake developing a "discount rate" from wind turbine affected sales versus non-affected sales in that area. The discount rate is a ratio, percentage demonstrating the impact on value.

And you'll probably want to discuss both the visual and noise from the turbines and how that is going to affect marketability and your opinion of value.

And you'll most definitely want to do this in a narrative format.
 
I'd rather see the occasional nuclear plant than those bird killers. Congress
is so dumb they take food and try to make it into fuel. Undoubtedly GE has
a good lobbyist who has convinced some dumb politicians that the 'its blowing
in the wind.' Driving I-10 and seeing that menagerie of windmills outside of
Palm Springs gave me a headache. I'm surprised no one has done the
calculation that if the earth has only so much mass and rotational inertia that
eventually slowing down the earth will contribute to global warming.

I think we have windmills because someone makes money selling them. The
'greens' like them, except if your Walter Cronkite or a Kennedy and it affects
your view.
 
Th
ey are certain this will have a negative impact on their property value.
This the one that the Kennedy's are fightin' - its offshore??

You can search the world over and think you found true luv...but I think it a pretty good guess that you won't find much evidence to back up the proposition that it will hurt their property values. Now...if they are sooo close that the sound from the gens are heard as low frequencies then perhaps you can make a noise argument.

I'm doing mind you doing hours of mind numbing research but you won't find any difference. It is the same as a cell tower. Everyone hates them but otherwise ignores them.

The only way I think you could find evidence would be to do some very serious regressions and that is a science project, not an appraisal problem and again, I suspect that you not find the smoking gun of low values. If you go to places where they are common, say, Kansas, Oklahoma, W. Texas you probably would find the opposite impact. A wealth effect would accrue to maintaining them in a remote area.

I don't know many places where Wind Mills are not fairly remote compared to your home state.
 
There was one recently approved along the NC coast with the same objections from the folks adjoining or nearby. I'm sure JRS or Offshore could provide some contacts.
 
well,.

Thats a bit vague on details.
Some of the questions that come to mind........

A. Where is the proposed turbine going to be? Will it sit above the village like some kind of technological vulture, just waiting to spew it cheap energy all over the cringing citizenry?

Or
B. Is this something like we're hearing in the northern Great Lakes area where the proposed turbine(s) is/are going to be somewhere over the horizon, in the ocean, (or lake as the case may be) where nobody can see it?

and/or
C. Is it really just one 400' turbine, or a small forest of 400 turbines, which is what I've been picking up on lately in various news media?

D. And, do the locals get a cut of the revenues generated?

Try this one from your local area www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index.php/2007/06/27/wind_farms_nearby_may_actuallt_increase?blog Cached - Similar pages

or maybe this from NAR
www.realtor.org/libweb.nsf/pages/fg509

I think these may be a good starting point, both locally and nationally. NAR has other links from this site.
 
I was recently contacted by a citizens group from my town. They are interested in how their properties will be affected by a proposed 400 foot wind turbine. They are certain this will have a negative impact on their property value. I have tried to research this by Googling but have spent an hour following lousy links. Would anyone have some experience, links or advice on where I can start to look? This is a small seaside community near Cape COD, MA.

Thanks,

Paul

Wow,sounds like an interesting assignment, do you have a CG helping you on this? In my area, I don't think there has been a negative impact on values, as more and more wind farms are popping up all over the place.

Alternative energy is not a bad thing...........

I wish I could power my van with wind..............I guess if I keep eating burritos I can power it with wind and methane.
 
This is a Loose-Loose assignment.

If you find it will not effect values, the Evangelical Greenies will love you and the Evangelical Never Change Anythings will hate you.
And Vissee-Versay.

Proceed it at your own peril.

:new_snipersmilie::peace:
 
You may also search CA in areas like Palm Springs which have had the wind turbines for over 20 years. You might be able to get some historical data regarding impact. Palm Springs is also generally viewed as a resort/second home area.
 
P--l--e--a--s--e...........T.......u.......r.......n...........
.........o.............f..............f..............
.........t....................h...........e..............................................
w...............i..............n..............d............m..............i...........l.........l.

The earth is slowing down to much!
 
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