How To Identify What Zoning a Property is In
In this article I wanted to identify how to identify the zone that a property is in.
Image courtesy gis2.nngov.com
REIN MLS Matrix for Hampton Roads Agents & in The Public in Some Cases
For Hampton Roads agents, the public in limited cases, and for other agents using a variant of MLS Matrix, the process is relatively similar. The below are possibly the fastest ways to find the zoning as long as the tax information pulls up properly. That said, in some cases, it won’t pull up properly or could be outdated.
Step 1: Check the zoning information in the listing:
1st check to see if the zoning information is in an active listing. If you look on Matrix there is a section for zoning under “General Description”, like in this example with C2 zone:
That said, sometimes a listing won’t include zoning information within the listing, as it’s optional:
When a property doesn’t include that information, if you’re within Matrix as an agent, go to the Tax section, and then the Zoning section:
If you're a member of the public, or if the tax information is missing within Matrix & you're an agent, it's sometimes best to go right to the tax records (see section on tax records).
Public, Most Accurate, But Takes a Little Longer & Many Different Websites to Navigate- Tax Records
Zoning information can change over time, & in some cases, there can be lag time between when the information from tax records populates into other locations like Realist.
To locate the tax records for a property, you could Google it (i.e. newport news va tax assessment search for 396 Georgetown Loop):
If you're in SE VA, you could go to my spreadsheet on the subject where I have a cheat sheet under the Maps & Specific Property Details Tab at the bottom:
Look 1st at the "Property Search" column:
All the city/county websites will be different, but here's an example for Newport News from the 2nd website listed on Google:
From there I click on the section for "Land Use and Zoning Details" which provides the information I need:
A section like that won't always be available, but another way to do it in some cases is to go to the printable larger version & do a search for zoning, though not in this case.
In some cases, you'll also be able to pull maps of zoning districts.
NARRPR - Agents
The process is pretty straightforward for members of NAR via NARRPR. You login, look up a property by address, and look under zoning:
