Just three days after closing Escrow on what we thought was our dream home, the new neighbor down the street pulled into our driveway to let us know that she'd been trying to catch us there ever since we first looked at the house.  Plans had already been finalized to put a new highway bypass just about a football field from our property line (and right through our neighbors house).  We were out in the county so there weren't many neighbors and already we were about to lose what turned out to be our best neighbor.  As soon as we found out, we called our "agent" ... well we thought she was OUR agent, but we didn't understand the laws of agency and didn't know that since we just called the name on the sign we really didn't have an agent.  The agent we worked with wasn't the listing agent but she was in the same company (so she still represented the seller).  The listing agent CLAIMED he didn't know what was going on with the property and that the sellers said they didn't know either, but we had already been told he was good friends with the sellers.... and we already knew that several mailings had gone out to the property owners regarding this bypass and the fact that in order to put in the bypass our road would be widened, as well (meaning that the local government was going to be buying about 20ft of frontage from us).  In the end we decided to just stay put for the simple reason that we had no where else to go and had already put a lot of money into the property in the short time we had it.  The house finally sold after 3 years on the market once the highway was finally finished.

We learned some important lessons from this event that I would like to pass on to you.

1. Don't call the agent on the sign.  If you are in the market for a house, get an agent that will represent YOU and your best interests and make sure that they know the area and the market. They aren't going to know EVERYTHING that may be going on in the area but they will have an idea.

2. If there's a lot of empty land next to your property, find out who owns it and what the plans are for the property.  Even if it's not a new highway, it might be a shopping mall or an apartment complex or even just a new subdivision ... it doesn't matter what it is when you move in thinking "oh there's nothing next to us" and then a year later suddenly there is, you'd much rather have known ahead of time.

3. Talk to the neighbors.  Before you buy, no matter how much you love the house and think you know the neighborhood, take the time to go knock on the doors of the neighbors and get to know them a bit and find out what they think of the neighborhood. If nothing else you may discover that you'd have a neighbor you couldn't stand to live next too (and again it's better to know early than late).