Closing Attorney & Title Services in Forest Hills, TN

Maybe it is the house on two wooded acres, and you are already pacing out the pool, the screened porch, the suite over the garage for a parent. Whether the contract is signed or still sitting in your inbox, it will not say whether the City of Forest Hills lets you build any of that. Forest Hills is a city of its own inside Davidson County, with its own zoning ordinance, its own building inspector and its own Board of Zoning Appeals, and its rules reach nearly everything you might change once the deed is yours. Selling? A careful buyer will be asking you these same questions, so have the answers in a folder before the offers come in. Buying your first home? The road from offer to keys →

The first question is how much the lot has left to give. Forest Hills sets a large minimum lot in every residential district: six acres in Estates 1A along Chickering and Page Roads, three in Estates A on Hillsboro Pike, two in Estates B, an acre and a half in Estates C along Granny White Pike, and one to one and a quarter acres in the older Residential A and Neighborhood Conservation districts. Acreage is not the same as room to build, though. The ordinance also caps coverage - in Estates 1A, buildings may cover no more than 5 percent of the lot, and every hard surface together, the pool and its deck included, no more than 14 percent. A house that has already spent that allowance leaves the next owner nothing for the addition or the pool. Find out the lot's district, get a survey that shows what is already on the ground, and do that arithmetic before you write the offer rather than after you own the shortfall. ^‡‡‡

A renovated house raises a different question: did the city sign off on the work? Forest Hills wants a permit for more than most people would guess - additions, decks and porches, pools, fences, retaining walls, driveways and patios, sheds, generator and HVAC slabs, even a roof replaced in like kind. The city's own inspector does the inspections, no third-party verification is accepted, and a job is not finished until the city issues a Use and Occupancy Certificate. So if the kitchen is new or the porch was enclosed last year, ask the seller for the permits and that certificate while your inspection period is still running. If they cannot be found, write into the contract what happens next, so an open permit file does not become yours at the closing table. Selling a house you improved? Pull those papers together now; it is an easier conversation before the buyer asks than after. ^‡‡

Forest Hills is written for people who live in their own houses. The zoning ordinance prohibits short-term rental property, multifamily dwellings and bed-and-breakfast homestays, so if rental income is part of how the numbers work for you, they will not work here. A suite for family is possible, with strings attached. An accessory apartment is allowed only in an owner-occupied house, may not be rented, must be lived in by a family member on the ordinance's list, and needs a covenant recorded with the Register of Deeds saying so. That covenant runs with the land: once you take the deed, it binds you. If the house you want already has a guest apartment, ask whether the covenant was recorded and get a copy of it before you sign. If nobody can find one, ask how the apartment came to be there before you agree to the price. ^‡‡

Then walk the ground itself. Any parcel with land at 800 feet of elevation or higher, or a slope of 20 percent or more, falls in the Hillside Protection Overlay, where disturbing the land may need the Board of Zoning Appeals. That board meets once a month, and a denial bars the same request for 18 months, so on a steep lot a plan can sit on the shelf for a year and a half. Trees have rules of their own: specimen trees and the canopy are protected, clearcutting is banned outright, and a clearcut suspends development approvals on that property for three years. Water is the third piece. Richland, Otter and Sugartree Creeks run through the city, and the city takes part in the National Flood Insurance Program. Before you sign, look the parcel up on FEMA's flood map, ask the seller in writing what trees have come down lately, and if the lot is steep, count a board hearing as part of the schedule. ^{‡‡‡‡‡}

The last stop is downtown. A Forest Hills deed is recorded with the Davidson County Register of Deeds on Deaderick Street. The city itself sends no property tax bill at all, so there is no second envelope to chase; the only bill is Metro's, which the Metro Trustee mails the first week of October and which can be paid through the last day of February. Closing in the fall or winter? Find out whether that bill has been paid, and by whom, and make sure the settlement figures reflect the answer before you sign them. ^‡‡‡ Who pays which closing costs in Tennessee →