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We will be looking for a house on Long Island in the near future (see my other thread asking for Town Suggestions) and I've already noticed on the MLS website that most of the large ranches on 1/2 acre or bigger lots have in-ground swimming pools.
We definitely don't want a house with a pool but it seems like it may be hard to find the kind of house we want that doesn't have one.
Can anyone tell me about having an in-ground pool removed?
Are there companies that specialize in this?
Is a demolition permit needed (from the town or county)?
About how much would removing the pool reduce the property taxes? (but this isn't why we don't want one; we just don't like them for several reasons)
About how much would it probably cost to have a standard size (about 16x32) vinyl lined in-ground pool removed, filled in, etc, on Long Island? (we wouldn't even consider looking at a house with a gunite pool)
My brother and his wife did that about ten years ago. I really liked that pool, but it's their home. Anyway, they made a neat little garden area there.
Apparantly it isn't always as simple as just filling in the hole with dirt.
Friends of ours who moved south about 8 years ago bought a house with an inground pool that they didn't want. They too thought it would be an easy thing to just fill it in, so that's what they did and then went to let the county or town know that the pool was no longer there (to get the benefit of lower taxes). That's when they found out that there were codes to be followed and permits required when a pool is removed. It was a real can of worms! They had to get a permit, then the fill-in had to be removed for inspection. Because it was just sand and dirt, that was against the code (there has to be so many feet of solid fill, like stones and rock) so it had to be done all over again 'properly' and inspected again. It ended up costing our friends almost $10,000 after paying for having the job literally done twice, plus the permit and repairing their landscaping after it was almost destroyed by all the heavy equipment being in there twice.
To add insult to injury, when the county/town revised their property taxes for the removal of the pool, the taxes went UP because the house hadn't been reassessed since it was built in the 1960s and the previous owner had done upgrades without letting the bureaucrats know about it.
Naturally that's another state, not NY or Long Island so that's why we'd like to know what the rules are for pool removals before we consider having to do that.
Naturally that's another state, not NY or Long Island so that's why we'd like to know what the rules are for pool removals before we consider having to do that.
So it's the towns (and not the county) on Long Island that impose the building codes? I wasn't sure about that. Thanks for the information.
I was talking to DH last night about this (again) and his thought was that if we found a house that was what we are looking for BUT it has a vinyl-liner pool AND the taxes were $10,000 or less -- the best idea might be to just have it filled in and not say anything to the town about it (in other words, as far as the town knows, the pool is still there and the taxes would continue to reflect that). "What the assessor doesn't know, can't hurt us." I think this makes sense, and can't see what harm it can do because we would not be trying to get away with paying LESS taxes (such as people who put in pools or decks without a permit do) -- we would actually be paying MORE (for a pool that we no longer have). We just don't want to find ourselves in the situation our friends down south did, of having the entire house reassessed higher due to the on-site inspections.
I would still like to know how much difference an in-ground pool makes in one's property taxes on Long Island, though. That's probably a question for another thread!
the best idea might be to just have it filled in and not say anything to the town about it (in other words, as far as the town knows, the pool is still there and the taxes would continue to reflect that). "What the assessor doesn't know, can't hurt us."
I recently read an article saying that more and more assessors use Google Earth and other satellite maps to find out about add ons and other changes on peoples' properties.
We also thought about removing our pool but decided against it. Although we may probably not use it much - we'll use our house in NE Florida only during Nov and Apr - we're going to resell the property some day and a pool may be a plus then. Our renters enjoy it a lot. So we are going to cover the pool with a deck that can easily be removed by any future owner. Would that be an option for you?
ISo we are going to cover the pool with a deck that can easily be removed by any future owner. Would that be an option for you?
Not really. There's a very good chance that the house we buy will be our permanent (retirement) home because we know we would never want to move anywhere south of New York City. We're looking at this as our probable "forever" house which is why we're so paranoid about getting everything right. It'll have to suit our needs for at least the next 30-plus years if not more, and after we're both gone it will be up to the kids to decide what to do with it.
Also, DH and I are both avid gardeners and the idea of a large deck or swimming pool taking up valuable potential planting space is something we'd never consider.
It will 100% be an issue when selling or doing a re-fi down the road.
Do it properly, trust me. You cannot just fill it in.
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