I had previously written an article about different ways one can achieve view preservation when it comes to a home site, particularly when adjacent properties have yet to be constructed. You can reference that article here, but I wanted to take a deeper dive into the nuance of building envelopes in this article.

Unfortunately, there are very few things in real estate that are absolute. As an example, one might build with an expectation that the Teton County is height limitation is 30 ft. While this is unlikely to change, there are provisions in the land development code that provide for agricultural buildings up to 60 ft. To be fair, however, it’s extremely unlikely that a subdivision might allow an agricultural building to be erected, and I haven’t seen a new grain elevator in Teton Valley in many decades. My point is that each of these different aspects of consideration have unlikely scenarios where they may be subject to change. Obviously, the best way to preserve a view is on your own property, but that’s not always attainable or realistic.

So, what is a building envelope? Building envelopes are areas on subdivision plat maps or even written into deeds (typically in the form of a deed restriction) designating an area where a home is designed to be built. These envelopes are typically strategically placed within the confines of subdivision boundaries so that everyone in that particular community is able to maintain a view. This makes perfect sense, has very few downsides, and provided original developers a way to add value to all of their lots without taking away from others based on the view corridor.

Over the years, I have considered building envelopes to be one of the gold standards in preserving views, right up there with platted community open space or even elbow room on your own building site. However, a few instances over the years have caused me to “downgrade” my outlook on building envelopes as a near ironclad way of preserving views. Before I move into a few examples, I would like to admit that these circumstances have been incredibly rare, but they have raised my level of concern as to how they were handled by both local government and their respective homeowners associations. Interestingly, I discovered that in almost all of these circumstances, the local government’s outlook on insignificant plat map changes (in this case moving internal building envelopes as opposed to shifting actual boundary lines) was that only a representative of the homeowners association was required to sign off as opposed to others in the community, and particularly, those impacted by the change from a view perspective. I have brought this to the attention of our local planning departments, so who knows, maybe we’ll see some consideration on the topic in the future. Back to those examples where I have seen building envelopes moved…

1) Wetland: I have seen two circumstances where a building envelope was moved as it was originally placed in a problematic wetland area. Essentially the developer identified a building envelope that was conducive to view preservation, but not necessarily taking wetland or terrain features into consideration. Additionally, it is possible that regulations around setbacks from wetland or other terrain features could (or have) change(d). When purchasing property in an area with significant slope, wetland, topographical features that might prevent construction, floodplain, waterways or otherwise, it might be a good idea not only to look at your own property in terms of the viability of constructing in a desired area or building envelope, but the adjacent properties in your view shed. 

2) Ignorance: Another circumstance included a landowner that either did not understand the building envelopes, or deliberately chose to build outside of their designated building envelope. While this did involve a fine, a slap on the wrist, and the requirement to retroactively move the building permit, the workaround to move the building envelope did not take into consideration the neighbor’s view. In subdivisions where associations aren’t established, activity is not monitored, or very few homes (or no homes) have been constructed, it might be worth considering staying involved with your association to protect your own interests, or at least keeping a close eye on activity.

3) HOA: Other circumstances I have witnessed over the years included homeowners associations removing, or modifying building envelopes at the discretion of some, but without consideration for others. While these decisions may have had reasonable intentions, they also had implications, whether those were considered or not. Here again, homeowners associations currently only require administrative authorization, and the local planning departments often do not require public notice for these “insignificant” changes. Once again, community involvement (as challenging as volunteer HOA work can be) can go a long ways, particularly in circumstances where these types of changes could have a significant impact on you, or your neighbor’s values.  To conclude, I’ll reiterate that these instances are rare, and obviously, there could be other examples that could have an impact on the need, or desire to move these envelopes. They could be unforeseen soil conditions, land development code changes with respect to setbacks which may have originally had more liberal requirements, or other unforeseen situations. While it’s unlikely to impact more than a handful of sites throughout the entire valley with these types of building envelope changes, it’s at least worth considering how it might affect you if things were to change.