Broker QuickCheck

A listing is an entitlement argument whether or not anyone makes it. This is the argument, in writing, on your listing, in two days.

The owner version of a QuickCheck answers whether a buyer should proceed. The broker version answers a different question: what is this land actually worth to the buyer who should be buying it, and who is that buyer. Same record, same two-day turn, aimed at the listing rather than at the acquisition.

What it answers

Six questions, in this order. What the listing says the site is. Whether that holds up. What the land will actually support at its best use. What that use is worth. Who buys it. And what the alternatives are worth if the first answer is wrong.

An example, in full

What follows is a real Broker QuickCheck with the parcel identifiers and the client removed. The site is 3.82 acres inside a North Carolina city, about a mile from a major university hospital. It came to market carrying a recorded development plan for 56 townhomes.

The report concluded the recorded plan was the problem rather than the asset, and repriced the land at roughly double what any residential scenario would support.

1. Listing snapshot

Fact	Finding
Size	3.82 acres, two contiguous parcels
Zoning	Office and Institutional, with a recorded development plan attached
Plan of record	56 townhomes
Stated asking price	None in the listing package
Location	About one mile from a major university hospital, inside city limits

The hospital adjacency is the single fact that drives the rest of the report. Everything else follows from asking who pays for it.

2. Go or no-go

Go, on a senior living basis and at a senior living price. The site works, but not as listed.

Topic	Risk	What the record showed
Water and sewer	2	City service present in the corridor. Capacity at the point of connection unverified, and it has to be confirmed against an institutional load rather than the townhome plan.
Environmental	1	No flood hazard, no wetlands, no stream buffers. Watershed coverage limits are the only item that reaches the site plan.
Zoning	3	The recorded plan locks the site to 56 townhomes. Changing it is a discretionary council vote.
Land use	2	Designation not yet confirmed. District purpose and site context both point favourably.
Approval time	2	24 to 36 months from application to approved construction drawings, with about $390,000 of entitlement cost and carry.
Market depth	1	Regional operators, healthcare REITs and national operators all active in the metro.

3. Highest and best use

Assisted living and memory care, 60 beds. One mile from a hospital is worth nothing to a townhome buyer and a great deal to a senior living operator. It converts a location fact into revenue, which is what a highest and best use question is actually asking.

The plan of record fails twice, independently. Density: the district caps residential at 11 units per acre, so the code-compliant maximum is 42 units, not 56. A buyer underwriting the recorded plan is underwriting 14 units the code will not issue. Price: at achievable townhome pricing the residual to raw land is about $840,000, roughly $220,000 an acre.

4. What the land supports

Line	Value	Basis
Annual gross revenue	$3,960,000	60 beds at $5,500 per bed per month
Effective gross income	$3,643,200	92 percent occupancy
Net operating income	$1,275,120	65 percent operating expense ratio
Stabilised value	$17,001,600	7.5 percent cap rate
Less vertical construction	($12,900,000)	$215,000 per bed
Less soft costs	($1,032,000)	8 percent of vertical
Less entitlement carry	($390,000)	Consultants, fees and land carry over 24 to 36 months
Supportable land value	$1,719,000	About $450,000 per acre

That is the top of the range and it assumes the rezoning lands. The bottom, $1.4 million, discounts for the probability and duration of a discretionary vote. Where a buyer prices inside that band is a function of how much entitlement risk they will hold. A buyer who requires an approved rezoning at closing sits at the bottom or below it.

This is a development residual, not an appraisal. It states what the analysed use supports at the stated assumptions, and it moves with construction cost, rents, cap rates and approval timing.

5. Who buys it

Buyer type	Why this site
Regional senior living operators	Already operating multiple facilities in the metro and expanding around hospital nodes
Healthcare REITs	Active acquirers in the state, including a $121.3 million portfolio purchase in 2024
National operators	Multiple communities in the region, active in infill medical-adjacent sites
Health systems	Partnership or ground lease rather than fee purchase, but the adjacency argues for the conversation

The likely structure is not a straight land sale. An operator or a REIT will want the entitlement resolved or a seller who will carry it, so the realistic paths are an operator letter of intent signed before the rezoning is filed, a contract contingent on the rezoning with extended diligence, or a sale of the entitled position once approved. The last is worth the most and takes 24 to 36 months to reach.

6. What else was tested

Four alternative scenarios were priced against the recommendation: for-sale townhomes at the code-compliant 42 units, build-to-rent townhomes at the same count, garden multifamily at 96 units, and medical office. None supported more than $840,000 of land value. The report carries the arithmetic for each so the listing can answer the question rather than deflect it.

What a broker does with it

Three things it changes. It prices the land against the buyer who should own it rather than against the plan someone recorded years ago. It names that buyer pool, which is a different call list than the one the listing implies. And when a buyer pushes back on price, the answer is a sourced document rather than a conversation.