There is a particular kind of dream attached to buying land in northern Michigan. You find a parcel with a ridge view or a stretch of frontage or a clearing in the hardwoods, and you stand there imagining what it will become. The impulse is understandable. The land here is genuinely extraordinary. But the gap between a beautiful parcel and a buildable one is wider than most buyers expect, and the due diligence required to cross that gap is more specific and more consequential than buying an existing home. Getting it right starts before the offer.
Land Is Not the Same as a Lot
The first distinction worth making is between a platted lot and a raw land parcel. A platted lot in a recorded subdivision typically has established road access, may have utility infrastructure nearby, and has been through some level of regulatory review as part of the platting process. A raw land parcel is none of those things until proven otherwise. The two require different levels of investigation and carry different risk profiles, and buyers who treat them the same often discover the difference at the worst possible moment.
In northern Michigan, both categories are available and both have genuine appeal. Platted lots in established neighborhoods near Traverse City or in villages like Suttons Bay and Glen Arbor offer the relative simplicity of a cleared path to building. Raw land parcels deeper in Leelanau County or Benzie County offer the possibility of something more private and more dramatic, but require considerably more investigation before you know what you are actually buying.
Zoning: The First Question to Answer
Before any other due diligence, a buyer needs to confirm that the intended use of the parcel is permitted under the governing zoning ordinance. Zoning in northern Michigan is administered at the township level, and the rules vary meaningfully between townships. A parcel that appears on a map as a buildable residential lot may be zoned agricultural, conservation, or resource protection in a way that limits or prohibits the residential use the buyer intends.
The Leelanau County townships and the townships of Grand Traverse County each maintain their own zoning ordinances, and the distinctions between them are real. Some townships have minimum lot size requirements for residential construction that may affect whether a parcel is large enough to build on. Some have setback requirements from water bodies, wetlands, or road rights-of-way that reduce the buildable envelope significantly. Waterfront parcels are subject to additional Michigan EGLE regulations governing shoreline development and vegetation removal that layer on top of local zoning.
Confirming zoning compliance for your intended use is a conversation with the relevant township zoning administrator, not just a reading of the parcel’s listing description. We recommend this call happen before an offer is written, not after.
The Septic Question: Perc Tests and What They Mean
In a region where municipal sewer service is the exception rather than the rule, the ability to install a compliant septic system is often the single most important determinant of whether a parcel is buildable. A piece of land without the soil conditions to support a conventional or alternative septic system is, in practical terms, not a buildable residential parcel regardless of what the zoning says.
The standard tool for assessing septic suitability is a percolation test, commonly called a perc test, which measures how quickly water moves through the soil at the proposed drain field location. Michigan’s Environmental Health department sets standards for perc rates and drain field sizing, and many counties in northern Michigan require a satisfactory perc test result before a building permit can be issued.
What buyers need to know:
• A perc test result is property-specific. A neighboring parcel passing does not mean your parcel will pass.
• Perc tests are typically conducted in spring or fall when soil moisture conditions are representative. Results obtained in unusually dry or wet conditions may not reflect typical performance.
• If a conventional drain field is not feasible, alternative systems including mound systems, drip irrigation, and other engineered solutions may allow development at higher cost. These are not guaranteed and require county health department approval.
• In some cases, parcels in northern Michigan are marketed without a current perc test result. Buying such a parcel without making the purchase contingent on a satisfactory perc test is a risk that has ended badly for buyers who assumed the land would pass.
Well Water: Depth, Flow, and Quality
Alongside septic, well drilling is a primary infrastructure cost and risk for raw land buyers in northern Michigan. The depth required to reach productive water varies significantly across the region, and the cost of drilling a well scales with depth. Areas with known shallow water tables are less expensive to develop. Areas with deeper or more variable aquifer conditions carry more uncertainty and higher potential cost.
A well that produces sufficient water volume, measured in gallons per minute, is required for residential occupancy. A well that produces water containing contaminants above allowable thresholds requires treatment before it is usable. Neither of these outcomes can be predicted with certainty before drilling, though local well drillers with regional experience can often advise on typical conditions for a given area based on neighboring well logs filed with the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy.
Buyers of raw land in northern Michigan should budget for well drilling as a line item rather than an afterthought, and should understand that the final cost is not fully knowable until the drill is in the ground.
Road Access: Public, Private, and Everything in Between
A parcel that is not accessible by a maintained road has a problem that is more expensive to solve than most buyers anticipate. In northern Michigan, parcels sometimes come to market with access described as private road, seasonal road, or two-track, and the implications of each are different and material.
A private road serving multiple parcels may have a road maintenance agreement in place, or it may not. Without a recorded maintenance agreement, the cost and responsibility for keeping the road passable falls to the landowners served by it, and disputes over maintenance obligations are common. A buyer who intends to build a year-round home on a parcel served by a seasonal two-track needs to understand what it will cost to upgrade that access to a standard that supports construction traffic and year-round use.
Confirming legal road access through the title commitment and reviewing any recorded easements before closing is not optional. It is foundational due diligence for any raw land purchase.
Building Timelines and Permit Reality
Buyers who purchase land with the intention of building in the near term are sometimes surprised by how long the path from purchase to shovel in the ground actually takes in northern Michigan. Between zoning review, septic approval, building permit application, and the scheduling realities of the region’s construction season, a timeline of twelve to eighteen months from land purchase to construction start is not unusual for buyers who are organized and move efficiently. For buyers who encounter complications along the way, timelines extend further.
The construction season itself in northern Michigan runs roughly from May through October, with meaningful constraints at both ends due to weather. A buyer who closes on land in the fall and hopes to break ground the following spring needs to have the permitting process well underway before winter.
The Right Land in the Right Hands
The Foerster Group has helped families, retirees, and investors find their place in northern Michigan, and land transactions are among the most consequential we navigate. The due diligence required is more specific and the variables are less forgiving than in a standard home purchase. A buyer who skips the perc test, takes road access on faith, or misreads a zoning ordinance can find themselves holding a parcel that cannot be built on at a price that assumed it could.
Getting land right in this market requires a specific kind of local knowledge and a willingness to ask every question before the offer is signed rather than after. We bring both. When you are ready to find your piece of northern Michigan, the conversation starts at thefoerstergroup.com.