Looking at some land that comes with a “protected” vineyard as I cannot build on it and I have two questions.
Am I inadvertently getting myself into trouble here…
You can rent the vineyard
And you could even ask for some of the finished product as part-payment!
Removing protected status from a vineyard in Vaud involves navigating federal, cantonal, and local laws, facing strong public and institutional resistance.
YMMV
I bet there are loads of people who would love to rent a vineyard.
Having said that, it’s not clear whether this is some large commercial sized one, or something more modest.
A good 1/3 of our village’s vineyards are rented and they come in interesting pieces big and small, likely due to splits resulting from settling estates over the centuries.There is a sort-of cooperative where the vintners share labour and equipment. A couple of the big vintners either own or rent big plots.
Ask the present owner what he does, and ask the commune about what is typical in that village.
Same where I live, from time to time there are local adverts saying so many sqm available for renting, in high German “Pacht eines Teils eines Weinbergs”.
Taking the wine as rent is probably beneficial for tax reasons but if you find you don’t like the wine then you are stuck…
It’s the same around here as well.
I’m guessing that removal of the ‘protected’ status would be virtually impossible … lengthy, time consuming, CHF***10 … with low chance of success …
In zurich, this was a premium piece of real estate. Many many real estate investors tried. The members/owners got fed up of the pushing and the multi-gazillion CHF offers. Eventually turned it into a ‘historically protected status’ … Subsequently, all the real estate investors disappeared …
You want to make sure the soil isn’t contaminated. Up until a few decades ago, perhaps until the 80ies, copper-based chemicals were commonly used to protect the grapevines against infections. As a result the metal accumulated in the soil.
Look for the Altlastenkataster (ALK) for the area. Check not only that particular property but also the surrounding ones (including what used to be one). Absent negative data I’d want the old owner to produce test results that demonstrate lack of contamination. I seem to recall that some groups lobbied that their type of soil didn’t make it into this registry, but don’t recall how sucessful they were; like the ALK that would probably be a cantonal matter anyways.
My guess is, getting rid of a protected status is virtually impossible.