Unusual situation: My house and my neighbor's house are on the same lot. Both properties are deeded as condos, not single family houses -- even though they are, in fact, single family houses. We share a water meter, a driveway, and a common area between the houses, but nothing else. We do not pay a condo fee and do not have a bank account for the condo association anymore, as we never used it -- we have a good relationship and have just worked out whatever needs to happen between us.
My neighbor now wants to sell his house. (We live in an east coast city where the market is very hot right now and prices have been going up in our neighborhood by about 5% a year. I expect a developer will buy his house and do a gut renovation.) If it's not too expensive, we are both interested in "de-condoizing" the 2 properties and dividing the lot between us.
I want to do this for privacy and to give myself some recourse should the new owners be awful. (The houses are pretty close together, and sharing the water/sewer bill as we do now, for instance, could quickly go south.) He wants to do it because he thinks he can get a better price for his house.
What should we be thinking about? I know we will have to probably get the land surveyed and property lines drawn, and that everything will also have to conform to zoning rules. We will also have to figure out the water situation -- not sure how they can split the line so that I have a separate meter. My neighbor is concerned about the impact on property taxes.
I am also interested in buying a portion of the common area between the houses so that my house has a proper front yard. (His house is in front, mine is in back, and there is about 18 feet between them, so it's not a huge space -- I'm guessing that setback rules may make this difficult since there will have to be both egress from his house through the back door as well as a required amount of space from the back of his house to the prospective property line.) I do have a side yard which is a a decent size for the city and is pretty nice, and he has a front and side yard.
Thanks for any insights!