How much land do you need to build a house in Central PA?

The amount of land you need depends on the municipality, the zoning, the utilities, the setbacks, the septic requirements and the house you’re trying to put on it.

I’ve seen properties that look enormous until you start drawing the setbacks, the septic system, the driveway, the house and the drainage onto them. I’ve also seen relatively small lots that make perfectly good building lots, because they’re flat, have public utilities and are laid out well.

So if you’re shopping for land, don’t start with how many acres is it?

There is no universal minimum lot size in Pennsylvania

This is probably the first thing to understand.

Pennsylvania doesn’t have one statewide rule saying every single-family house requires a quarter acre, half an acre or one acre. Lot size and dimensional requirements are established locally, through municipal zoning and subdivision ordinances, under the framework the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code gives local governments.

Depending on the municipality and the zoning district, those rules can set minimum lot area, lot width, setbacks, building coverage and other dimensional requirements.

Never buy land because somebody tells you it’s an acre, so you’ll definitely be able to build on it. Maybe. Let’s check first.

Start with the zoning district

Before I’d spend much time designing a house, I’d find out how the property is zoned, then pull the requirements for that district. We’re looking for:

• Minimum lot area
• Minimum lot width
• Front setback
• Side setbacks
• Rear setback
• Maximum lot coverage
• Maximum building height

This is where the difference between lot size and buildable area starts to matter. You might own a 100-foot-wide lot. That doesn’t mean we have 100 feet available for the house. Setbacks start shrinking the box.

A one-acre lot is not a one-acre building pad

An acre is 43,560 square feet. That sounds enormous next to a 2,000 square foot house.

But we’re not dropping a rectangle anywhere we want. We’ve got property lines, setbacks, driveway access, topography, utilities, septic, well, drainage and easements. Maybe wetlands or a stream. Maybe a right-of-way. Maybe an odd-shaped parcel. Maybe the nicest-looking part of the lot is also the worst place to build.

Public water and sewer can make a smaller lot much easier

This is a major distinction.

If a building lot has public water and public sewer available, we don’t need to fit a private well and an on-lot septic system onto the property. That makes smaller lots much more practical, and it’s one reason you see denser development where public utilities exist.

So when somebody tells me a lot is small, one of my first questions is what’s serving it.

If you’re intentionally trying to keep a new build affordable, public water and sewer are two of the first things I’d look for.

Septic can decide whether the lot works at all

If there’s no public sewer, pay attention here.

Pennsylvania regulates on-lot sewage through the state’s Act 537 sewage facilities program, with municipalities and certified Sewage Enforcement Officers handling the planning and permitting of individual systems.

In practical terms, we need somewhere to put the septic system — and not every patch of dirt is suitable for one. Soil conditions matter. Slope matters. Property lines matter. The well matters. The proposed house location matters. And the system itself needs enough appropriate area.

Depending on the property, sewage testing and planning can change where we’re able to put everything else.

This is something I’d want figured out before buying land whose value depends on being able to build a house there.

A perc test can change the entire plan

You’ll hear people talk about a lot “percing.” They’re talking about testing tied to whether the ground is suitable for an on-lot sewage system. There’s more to sewage approval than passing one magic test, but the basic point holds: the ground has to work for the proposed system.

Maybe it works exactly where you expected. Maybe another part of the property works. Maybe a different system is required. Maybe that changes the cost substantially. Or maybe the property isn’t a practical building lot for what you’re trying to do.

That’s why cheap rural land deserves some homework.

Well placement takes space too

If public water isn’t available, you’re probably looking at a private well. Worth knowing: DEP does not regulate private residential wells at the state level, though some municipalities have adopted their own requirements.

From a site-planning standpoint the well still matters. It has to coexist with the house and the septic system.

So now our site plan has the house, the driveway, the septic, the well and the setbacks — and we’re still not finished.

The shape of the lot matters almost as much as the size

Give me two one-acre lots. One is reasonably rectangular. The other is 60 feet wide and runs forever. Those aren’t equivalent building lots.

A narrow lot creates problems with side setbacks and house width. A pie-shaped lot may have plenty of acreage but very little width where you actually want the house. An irregular parcel can create strange setback conditions. A corner lot can have different dimensional rules because it fronts two roads.

Don’t get hypnotized by acreage. Look at the dimensions.

Your house has to fit too

A 1,600 square foot two story and a 3,000 square foot ranch don’t need the same footprint. That’s another reason there’s no useful answer like “you need an acre to build a house.”

A two story puts a lot of square footage over a relatively small foundation. A sprawling ranch puts considerably more house on the ground.

Then maybe you want a three-car garage. A covered porch. A rear patio. A walkout basement. A pool someday. A detached shop. RV parking. A large backyard.

Don’t forget the garage

People miss this when they sketch things out themselves. They picture the house footprint and then remember there’s a 24, 30 or 40-foot-deep garage attached to it.

Front-load, side-load, three-car, detached — each changes the width and depth of the overall footprint. A side-load garage in particular needs more room for the driveway and turning area to work comfortably.

If the garage matters to you, put it on the site plan from day one. Don’t try to squeeze it in afterward.

The driveway can become a bigger deal than you think

You need to get from the road to the house. Simple enough — until the house sits 500 feet back. Or the road is substantially higher than the building site. Or lower. Or the property is steep. Or there’s a drainage ditch. Or the entrance doesn’t work where you thought it would.

Now we’re talking about excavation, stone, drainage, possibly culverts, and a lot more driveway.

Which is one reason I’d be careful about putting the house as far from the road as physically possible just because the lot is large. That distance affects more than privacy. It affects construction.

Topography can matter more than acreage

A flat half-acre may be easier to build on than five acres on the side of a mountain.

Slope affects excavation, foundation, driveway, drainage, retaining walls, walkout basement opportunities, utility runs, equipment access, where excess dirt goes, and how the yard works once construction is finished.

A sloped property isn’t necessarily bad. Some of the best building lots aren’t flat — you get views and a natural walkout basement. But the house needs to work with the land. Forcing a house designed for a flat subdivision lot onto a steep property gets expensive.

Water is one of the first things I’d look at

Where does the water go? That’s a far more important question than where the house would look best.

• Is water coming toward the proposed building site?
• Is the lot sitting below the road?
• Is there a low area, a stream, wet ground, evidence of runoff?
• Where will roof water go? Where will driveway water go?
• Can we establish positive drainage away from the foundation?

This is something to look at before buying the property, not after excavation starts.

Wetlands and streams can change what you can do

If a property contains wetlands, streams or other regulated water features, don’t assume owning the land means you can fill or disturb them however you like. DEP’s Chapter 105 stream and wetland program regulates water obstructions and encroachments in streams, wetlands and floodways, and permits may be required depending on the work.

This doesn’t mean a property with a stream or a wet area is unbuildable. It means we need to understand what we’re looking at.

Easements can take away land you thought you had

The survey matters. There may be a utility easement, a drainage easement, an access easement, a shared driveway, a pipeline, a right-of-way, or something else crossing the property.

You may still own the land inside an easement, but your ability to build there can be restricted.

Which is why I’d rather work from an actual survey than a screenshot of the parcel from a real-estate listing.

Check the road access

A parcel can have plenty of acreage and still create access problems. Does it actually front a public road? How much frontage? Is there legal access? Is the proposed driveway location workable? If it’s a rear parcel, how is access established? Does the municipality have minimum width or frontage requirements?

These aren’t questions I’d leave until after closing.

Don’t assume you can subdivide it later

This comes up with larger parcels. We’ll buy ten acres, build on two and sell the rest later.

Maybe. But don’t put that future money into your financial plan until you’ve investigated whether subdivision is actually feasible. Subdivision and land development in Pennsylvania are handled through local municipal and county processes under the same Municipalities Planning Code, and future lots may need to satisfy their own requirements for size, width, access, utilities, sewage and setbacks.

So how much land would I want for a normal house?

Now we’re into preference rather than code.

For a typical new home, I don’t think you need several acres unless you actually want several acres. A well-laid-out lot with public utilities can give you plenty of room for a house, a garage and a usable yard without being enormous.

Move into rural properties with well and septic and I’d generally be more comfortable having additional room. Not because Pennsylvania requires some specific acreage — it doesn’t. Because more space gives us more options: more potential septic locations, more flexibility with house placement, more room to work around topography, more separation from neighbors, more ability to accommodate garages, shops or future improvements.

But there’s a point where additional acreage isn’t helping the construction project anymore. It’s just additional land, and additional land has to be bought and maintained.

One acre can be huge or tiny depending on what you’re building

Imagine a one-acre lot with public sewer, public water, flat ground, good road frontage, reasonable setbacks, a compact two story and a two-car garage. That’s probably plenty of property for the project.

Now take another acre. Well. Septic. Large ranch. Three-car side-load garage. Odd lot shape. Steep ground. Large setbacks.

Suddenly that acre doesn’t feel very big.

That’s why I’d never tell somebody how much land they need without knowing what they want to build and where they’re looking.

Don’t buy the lot before you know the house fits

This is probably the most important part of this article.

People fall in love with land, and I understand it. You walk the property. There’s a view. Trees. A creek. Privacy. You can already picture the house sitting there.

Then somebody starts doing actual due diligence. Wrong zoning. Setback problem. Septic issue. Wetlands. Bad access. House doesn’t fit where you thought it would. Site work costs a fortune.

Before I’d close on a building lot, I’d want reasonable confidence that the property works for the project. Not just that somebody described it as a building lot in the listing.

What I’d check before buying land in Central PA

If I were buying a lot for my own house, I’d want answers to these before getting too committed:

• What municipality is it in, and how is it zoned?
• Is my intended use permitted?
• What’s the minimum lot size, and what are the setbacks?
• What are the lot-width and coverage requirements?
• Does the proposed house and garage actually fit?
• Is public water available? Is public sewer available?
• If not, what do we know about well and septic feasibility?
• Is there a current survey? Are there easements?
• Are there wetlands, streams or flood concerns?
• How does the property drain?
• Where does the driveway go, and what’s the topography like?
• What will site work probably involve?
• Where are the utilities?
• Is subdivision part of the future plan?

That sounds like a lot. It is.

So how much land do you need?

Enough for the house. Enough for the garage. Enough to satisfy zoning. Enough for the required setbacks. Enough for water and sewage. Enough to access the property. Enough to manage drainage. And enough left over to give you the property you actually wanted in the first place.

For one house that might be a relatively small lot with public utilities. For another it might make sense to have an acre or more. For somebody who wants privacy, a shop, a large yard and room between neighbors, it may be several acres.

For homeowners looking to build around Selinsgrove, Lewisburg, Sunbury, Northumberland, Danville, Shamokin Dam, Milton, Watsontown and the surrounding Central PA area, I’d rather look at the actual parcel before telling you what house belongs on it.

Common questions