Plats 101: Taxes & Plat Names img

Plats 101: Taxes & Plat Names

calender icon 4/26/2023    poster icon  Mark Goodman

We deal a lot with plats in commercial title insurance transactions. Our plats 101 blog series breaks down the basics of plats. In this article, we’re going to take a look at plat names, and tax considerations when dealing with plats.

Taxes

An important point to note is that when a plat is filed, taxes on the affected land must be paid in full for the tax year in which that plat is being filed. In Minnesota, taxes are paid in May and October. If the plat is filed before those taxes have become due, the taxes will have to be paid in full for the remainder of the year. That can often be a significant bill that is not necessarily anticipated early on in the year, so it’s something important to keep in mind and an expense for which allocation will have to be made.

Plat Names

Plats have to contain specific details, and these details arise out of both statutory and local jurisdictional requirements. It’s important to pay attention to the plat name. Abbreviations are not permitted in plat names, nor are hyphens and other special characters. Furthermore, the plat name should not be a duplicate of an existing plat already of record in the county, nor should it be too similar to any plat already existing in the county.

By way of example, if there is an Anderson’s Addition to the City of Minneapolis, a plat titled Andersen’s Addition to Minneapolis will not be permitted because there is too great of likelihood of confusion. However Anderson’s 1st Addition, Anderson’s 2nd Addition, Anderson’s 3rd Addition, and so forth, are acceptable because these renditions are easy to distinguish among.

When determining a plat name, a search should be done in the county to ensure that there’s not going to be any duplication or too great of a similarity because that could result in a rejection of the plat.  In that event, the party creating the plat would have to come up with a new name, and create a new plat.