Arbor Creek

Preserved open space, and what preserved means

Ten acres of natural open space inside a subdivision is a substantial commitment of ground, and the word preserved is doing work that deserves examination.

In a development of this type the open space is generally association common area, which is the third of the four tiers of protected open space: protected while the association holds it and its governing documents say so. That is real, and in practice it is durable — but it is a decision the association could in principle revisit, and it is land the owners collectively fund.

The tier above it is a recorded conservation easement, which runs with the land, survives a change of owner and of township board, and cannot be undone by a future decision. Some developments preserve open space that way rather than as common area, and where they have, the protection is materially stronger. It is worth asking which applies here, because both get described as preserved and only one is beyond the association's own reach.

The practical difference matters most over long horizons. Association common area is protected by the documents and by the collective interest of the owners, which is usually enough. A recorded easement is protected by the instrument itself, which does not depend on anyone's continuing interest.

Either way, ten acres of woodland is a maintenance obligation as well as an amenity. Trails need resurfacing, trees near buildings need inspection and eventual removal, and woodland management is a recurring cost. The reserve study and the budget should name it.

Pittsfield Township, with an Ann Arbor address

Pittsfield Charter Township occupies the ground south and east of the City of Ann Arbor, and it is one of the more consequential municipalities in this county precisely because so much of it carries other places' names in the mail.

The township is a separate government with its own board, tax rate, services, zoning and assessor. An Ann Arbor mailing address here does not mean Ann Arbor taxes, Ann Arbor services or Ann Arbor schools — a mailing address is a delivery route, not a jurisdiction.

School assignment follows a third line again. Pittsfield Township is served in part by Ann Arbor Public Schools and in part by Saline Area Schools, and the boundary follows neither municipal nor postal lines. The clearest example sits a few miles away: a subdivision whose addresses read Ann Arbor, whose taxes go to Pittsfield Township, and whose children attend Saline schools — three different answers, all three correct.

A city sale and a township sale are not interchangeable without adjustment, and neither are two township sales in different districts.

A ten-year build span across several plans

Built primarily through the 1990s and into the early 2000s, this subdivision spans a decade or so, which means the earliest and latest houses are genuinely different products.

The clearest example is supply piping. Polybutylene was in wide residential use until it stopped in the mid-1990s, which means houses from the earlier part of this window may have it and those from the later part probably do not. That difference means the piping must be identified by material during the inspection rather than inferred from the subdivision.

Several floor plans across a range of 1,900 to 2,800 square feet is a spread of about fifty percent — meaningful but coherent. Where a builder used a catalog, identifying which plan a house is and finding a recent sale of the same plan is what turns an approximate analysis into a tight one.

A decade-long span also usually means more than one recorded plat. Restrictions attach to plats rather than to marketing names, so obtain the instrument recorded against the specific parcel from the Washtenaw County Register of Deeds rather than a general set circulated under the subdivision's name.

At twenty-five to thirty years the rest of the agenda is predictable: original roofs at or past a first covering, original furnaces, air conditioning and water heaters beyond normal expectancy, original double-glazed windows showing seal failure, and cladding of the period whose performance depends on how ends and edges were sealed.

Four tiers of protected open space

Where open ground adjoins a property, ownership is the first thing that decides whether it stays open — but not the only one.

Land held by a public body is generally the most durable, though a public body can still sell or repurpose land. Land under a recorded conservation easement is next — an easement runs with the land, surviving a change of owner and of local board. Association common area is real protection that the owners themselves pay for. Unbuilt private land carries the least protection of the four, but that is not the same as none: zoning, recorded deed restrictions and state wetland regulation can each constrain what may be built, filled or cleared, and EGLE requires authorization for specified activities affecting regulated wetland.

From a window all four look identical, which is why it is worth checking the record rather than the view: ownership, any recorded easement or restriction, the zoning, whether wetland is mapped, and whether a development application has already been approved.

Schools

Assignment here is set by address rather than by neighborhood name, and district boundaries in this county cross municipal and postal lines routinely. Ann Arbor Public Schools reaches beyond the city limits into surrounding townships in places, and other districts reach into others, so a township property can carry either.

School district is one of the larger drivers of price difference between otherwise comparable houses, so comparable sales should be matched on district as well as on municipality, form and size.

What a 1990s subdivision association typically holds

Where a subdivision of this era has an association, what it owns is usually narrower than in a condominium and worth establishing precisely, because it determines both the assessment and what the owners can be assessed for.

In a platted subdivision, the streets are commonly public and maintained by the municipality, the houses and lots are owned outright, and the association holds only the common open space, any entrance planting, and sometimes a detention basin. That is a modest responsibility and it generally produces a modest assessment.

The detention basin is the item most often overlooked. Where a subdivision has one, it is a piece of stormwater infrastructure with a maintenance obligation: it silts up, it needs vegetation management, and its outlet structure needs attention. Where it is association-owned, that is a real budget line and a real reserve item, and where it is not maintained the consequences reach beyond the association.

So the questions are: what does the association own, what does the assessment cover, is there a reserve, and is there a detention basin or drainage easement anywhere in the plat. The recorded plat shows easements and dedicated land; the association budget shows the rest.

Where the streets are private rather than public — which is less common in a subdivision of this type but does happen — that changes the picture entirely, because road reconstruction is the largest expense any association can face. The recorded plat says whether the streets were dedicated to the public.

Buying or selling here

The open space is the product and the township questions are the diligence.

For a seller, establishing whether the preserved land is common area or under a recorded easement is the single most valuable piece of preparation — because if it is the latter, that is a stronger and more durable claim than most sellers are able to make, and it is worth stating.