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lot. Based on the Benning report, Mr. Sapperstein assumed that
either 15 or 16 lots could be developed on the land and,
accordingly, has the opinion that the value of the land before
conveyance of the easement to the county is either $675,000 or
$720,000.
Both Messrs. Lipman and Sapperstein are well qualified and
provided us with helpful testimony. They both used sales of
comparable properties to value the land before the conveyance of
the easement to the county. Indeed, they relied on many of the
same sales (of comparable properties) in reaching their
respective conclusions. They agree that a dollar-a-lot basis is
an appropriate basis for comparison. Because Mr. Lipman did not
have an engineer’s estimate of lot yield, he did not make a
dollar-a-lot comparison, but, instead, relied on a dollar-an-acre
comparison. Messrs. Lipman and Sapperstein reach different
conclusions, which are difficult to reconcile because of the
different basis of comparison adopted by each. We are not
persuaded by Mr. Sapperstein that a dollar-a-lot basis is
necessarily superior to a dollar-an-acre basis for making
comparisons (we would have preferred to have each expert use
both). Mr. Lipman, however, at trial, agreed that “a
knowledgeable buyer of the property would buy this property based
on a lot yield as opposed to an acreage basis” and, in his
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