A pretty straightforward one from the Mississippi Supreme Court. Mississippi Transportation Comm’n v. United Assets, LLC, No. 2014-SA-01181-SCT (Feb. 11, 2016), involved a partial taking by MDOT at the intersection of I-59 and Highway 42.
The state’s appraiser concluded that commercial development was the highest and best use of the land and settled on the sales comparison approach, explaining “that, when taking the sales comparison approach, the appraiser arrives at a value using sales of real estate similar to the subject property, making adjustments as needed for differences between each sale and the subject property.” Slip op. at 3. After concluding that the remainder parcel’s HBU was also commercial development, he opined that just compensation for the taken land was $826,035.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the property owner’s witnesses disagreed. First its appraisers, a real estate agent, and one of its members testified that the remainder parcel could not be
