Maria Mak - Burnaby Realtor - Any property – a home, an apartment building, a farm, or an industrial site – can be on contaminated land.

Any property – a home, an apartment building, a farm, or an industrial site – can be on contaminated land.

Too often, contamination such as hazardous wastes in soil, groundwater or sediment is invisible, and harmful to human health and safety, and to the environment.

Cleanup costs can be expensive and may even exceed the value of the property.

To help buyers find out if a property they’re considering buying is contaminated, ask your REALTOR® to check the provincial contaminated Site Registry.

It has information on more than 9,000 sites, including:
• sites that are being screened and are not yet confirmed as being (or not being) contaminated
• sites that are being cleaned up
• sites that are awaiting final confirmation that cleanup is complete
• sites where cleanup is confirmed

Access to the Site Registry is through BC Online.

Improved website

The Ministry of Environment has detailed electronic and paper records often needed by those engaged in land transactions as part of the due diligence search process.

To make access to these records easier, the BC Ministry of Environment has recently developed a more user-friendly Site Remediation website.

It includes fact sheets, access to the Site Registry and other databases including the:
• Federal Contaminated Site Inventory
• Environmental Violations Database (EVD)

Contact Maria Mak and her elite team @ Sutton Centre Realty for all your premium real estate services, or visit her webiste www.mariamak.com for updated market real estate news.