A house with a lift station?

[miamicuse]

I am looking at a property in south Florida area and there is something that concerns me.

The owner told me all the houses in the neighborhood are on septic tanks. But his house is not. His house was originally built and owned by the city engineer at the time, and he had a lift station installed on the property. He showed it to me, it looked like a well with a handle to open and close the valve. He told me this property has a direct connection to the city sewer and there is a primary pump and a back up secondary pump to pump the waster water to the main sewer line. The main sewer line is not far from the property, but the city is slow in getting them connected (he said the city has been saying they will be connected "soon" for seventeen years).

He said he has someone that comes by to service/check the lift station once every quarter, and he has to go out and check to see if it is ok every month himself to make sure the pump continue to work.

I am not sure of all the specifics of what is involved to check to see if the pump still works, is this a maintainance nightmare I am getting into or this is a neat feature to have? Does having a "lift station" enhance property value?

MC

[Art Todesco]

[Pop]

Unless there were some other VERY compelling reason to buy that particular property, I think I'd be having second and third thoughts about it. If it was a plus to have, you'd see that in the price of the house. Is the price lower/higher than expected? How about tax assessments compared to neighbors? I guess you could always opt right away to put in a septic and forget about that thing for now. Then you could do it either way, whatever happens. But I'd never feel comfortable with something I knew so little about. I understand the concept, but 17 years makes it sound like a "forget it" to me. Can you find out if there are any municipal annexations in the works? Still, I'd pass unless I could get them to drop the price by whatever a septic install was going to cost.

Just my two cents.

Pop

[Edwin Pawlowski]

In theory, the design is a good one. The question is how well executed it is and what condition the equipment is in. Ejector toilets, pumping stations and the like can work very well if properly installed. I'd not take any crap from by neighbors though.