Buying land in Arizona: what to check

Terranown covers 15 of Arizona's 15 counties. Find a parcel on the map.

Cheap acreage in Arizona is easy to find. Land you can live on is a narrower category, and the difference is almost always water, followed closely by access.

Start with water

Arizona manages groundwater most strictly inside its Active Management Areas — around Phoenix, Tucson, Prescott, Pinal County, Santa Cruz County, and Willcox. Within them, new subdivisions must show a 100-year assured water supply, and in recent years the state has limited new groundwater-based certificates in the Phoenix area. Outside the AMAs the rules are looser, but that means less assurance, not more water.

For a single rural parcel, the practical questions are whether there is a well, how deep and productive wells nearby are, whether a shared well agreement exists, or whether the land depends on hauled water. The Department of Water Resources keeps well records you can search.

Check the washes

Dry washes carry fast, violent water during monsoon storms. Many are mapped as flood zones and regulated by county flood control districts, and some are federally regulated waters too. A wash across the driveway route can mean a road that floods every summer.

Confirm legal and physical access

Large tracts in Arizona were split into smaller lots without the roads a formal subdivision would have required. Some are reached only by unrecorded tracks across other people’s land, or across State Trust land you have no right to use. Confirm legal access from the title work, and drive the route.

Ask how the lot was created

Splitting land into six or more lots generally triggers state subdivision rules and a public report from the Department of Real Estate. Lots created by repeated splits to avoid that process — sometimes called wildcat subdivisions — can lack legal access, utilities, and drainage, and counties may limit permits on them.

Plan for septic and power

On-site wastewater systems are permitted under state rules, usually through the county, and caliche or shallow rock can complicate them. Power lines can be miles away; get a quote from the utility before you count on service.