Brokers Seek Speedier Review

One hundred real estate brokers invaded East Hampton Town Hall Friday for a face-to-face forum with a panel of local officials. Friday's event was organized on behalf of the new Eastern Long Island Realtors Association with the help of an East Hampton real estate broker who led a successful move two years ago to liberalize clearing restrictions on small residential lots.

Michael DeSario, the Cook-Pony Farm broker who led that drive, helped organize Friday's forum. Similar gatherings were held the previous week in Southampton and yesterday in Southold.

In Southampton, the brokers were greeted by a guide on how to navigate the planning and permit review process there. In East Hampton, many of the brokers had questions or complaints about properties that do not conform to current zoning, saying they were subject to more and stricter regulations than conforming parcels.

Goal Is "Cooperation"

Mr. DeSario said the group was seeking relief through rapport: "We want brokers to have a better relationship with the town. If you look back 10 years ago, there was always this us-against-them attitude. What we're working toward and accomplishing is much more cooperation."

Edwin Geus, who also is with Cook-Pony Farm, said the Zoning Board of Appeals' required six-month lead time on variances and permits was in effect a "taking" of private property. He asked whether officials could speed things up.

Applications that meet zoning go through an expedited review that winds up in about a month, said Lisa Liquori, the planning director. She said it was failure to conform to the code, not any government foot-dragging, that could add several months to the process.

Daunting Waits

Richard Whalen, the town attorney for planning and zoning matters and author of frequent code amendments, answered that he thought it was unlikely.

"To the extent that you speed the process up, you'll be encouraging more applications, which would tend to extend the time again," said Mr. Whalen. The Z.B.A., he said, could not "put 12 applications on in one night" and still consider each request carefully.

John Keeshan, who owns a brokerage in Montauk, said he appreciated the town's efforts to protect the environment, but he accused it of not being "user-friendly." He said a six-month wait for a wetlands variance to build a house was daunting to a prospective buyer and that many sellers were "intimidated" by the regulations.

Wetlands Variances

Urging Mr. Keeshan to "tell us how to make the process easier," Ms. Liquori said nearly all the vacant lots left in Montauk, and many elsewhere in town, contain wetlands, which are protected under state law.

If the town did not protect them, the State Department of Environmental Conservation would, she said, and property owners would have to go to the nearest D.E.C. office, in Stony Brook, to apply for variances from the required setbacks.

"The town is more accessible," she said, adding that East Hampton had in recent years "drastically reduced the delays we used to be known for."

Other officials on the panel were Town Supervisor Cathy Lester, Fred Sellers, the senior building inspector, and two assessors, Fred Overton and Jeanne Nielsen.

Plenty Of Homework

One broker was unclear about how or when new landowners would discover the existence of zoning limitations or other nonconformities if a broker didn't tell them or didn't know. The answer: when he or she applies for a building permit.

To preclude disappointment and complaints, Ms. Liquori recommended that brokers do their homework early on.

For example, she and others said, if a deal involves a lot in a subdivision, the broker should read the entire file on that subdivision and be able to tell the buyer about the zoning, the location of scenic easements, a building envelope, or any unusual restrictions.

Welcome Stranger

One broker asked Mr. Overton and Ms. Nielsen whether it was true that East Hampton reassessed property after each sale. She was told the town did not, but that a sale or the issuance of a new certificate of occupancy could trigger an inspection. Any change in the property since the last inspection could then alter the assessment, for better or worse.

Fred Mittmann, a mortgage and real-estate broker, advised the packed audience that mortgage lenders and title companies were now requiring new certificates of occupancy before closings.

And Mr. Sellers confirmed that, as a result, building inspectors were discovering more decks, pools, sheds, and other structures, sometimes put up many years ago, without a permit.

Brokers said the time then needed for a seller to clear up any illegality or nonconformity - usually involving an application to the Z.B.A. and a wait of a few months or more - was more and more becoming a deal-buster.

The new realtors' group has 400 members and is a chapter of the National Association of Realtors, the largest trade organization in the country, Mr. DeSario said after the forum. He envisions an annual tune-up meeting between members and town officials, and periodic forums "on specific concerns."

"It's easy to sell a new house. The focus has to be on the more difficult situations we have to deal with that could complicate a sale," he said.