The plots that clients ask us for first are the ones with the sea in front of them, and the plots that cause the most trouble when bought without preparation are the same ones. The coast of Montenegro is beautiful because it is steep, rocky and exposed, and each of those three words is also a building question. This guide sets out the checks we run on a coastal plot before we tell a client to buy it, and the sequence that follows once they do.
Where does the public shoreline end and your plot begin?
A strip along the Montenegrin coast is managed as a public maritime zone with its own rules and its own administrator. Private villas are not built on it; they are built above it, and the boundary between the two is a line that matters more than any other on a sea-front parcel. The planning conditions for the parcel show where the buildable area begins, and the cadastre shows where the parcel ends. The two lines are not always the same.
A parcel that reaches the water usually has a portion below the line that cannot be built on but can still be used, as a garden or a path to the water, under the rules of the zone. A buyer should know which part of the price is for the buildable land and which for the strip below it. Our guide to the urbanistic technical conditions explains how that document is obtained and read.
What is under the topsoil?
The coast is limestone. Under a few centimetres of red soil and scrub there is rock, and the rock decides the cost of the foundations, the pool and every retaining wall. A geotechnical survey, a few boreholes read by an engineer, tells you whether you are building on solid rock, fractured rock or a pocket of fill, and it is the second document we obtain after the planning conditions.
Rock is good news for stability and bad news for excavation. A pool cut into solid limestone is expensive to dig and cheap to hold; a pool on fill needs a different structure. The survey turns both into a number before the design starts, which is the only way to keep a build within its budget.
Which way does the plot face?
Most of the open coast faces south-west, which gives afternoon sun on the terrace and a sunset over the sea. Inside the Bay of Kotor the shore winds around, and a plot on the northern side faces south across the water, while a plot on the southern side faces north and sits in shade for much of the winter. Neither is wrong, but they are different houses to live in and they are priced differently by buyers who know the bay.
We walk every coastal plot at two times of day before listing it, and we tell clients where the sun is at four in the afternoon in July and at noon in January. The plot we present at Kotor Bay is a good example of orientation being the reason for the price rather than the size.
How do wind, salt and sun shape the design?
Three local conditions that a buyer from inland Europe may not expect:
- The bura, a cold north-east wind that comes down from the mountains in winter, strong enough to shape the design of terraces and the fixing of roofs on exposed plots
- Salt air, which corrodes untreated metal and demands marine-grade fixings, joinery and render
- Summer sun at an intensity that makes shading, orientation and the mass of the walls a matter of comfort, not style
A local architect designs around all three without being asked. A design imported from a northern climate and built as drawn is the usual source of a villa that is cold in February and unbearable in August.
Can the machinery reach the plot?
A steep plot with the view is often reached by a narrow concrete lane with a hairpin bend. The lane that is fine for a car may not be fine for a concrete mixer, a crane or a lorry carrying the pool shell. Before buying, we drive the route with a builder and confirm what can reach the site, what must be transferred to smaller vehicles and whether a temporary access across a neighbour's land is needed for the works.
Access is also a legal question, not only a physical one. The road serving the plot must be public or secured by a registered right of way, and we cover that in our guide to access roads and easements.
What do the setback and height rules do on a slope?
On a flat plot the setbacks take a strip off each side and the height rule takes the top off. On a slope the height is counted from the terrain in a specific way, and a floor that is below ground at the back of the house may be a full storey at the front facing the sea. The planning conditions and the architect's reading of them decide whether that lower floor counts, and the answer changes the size of the villa by a whole floor.
The rules that protect views and set distances from the sea are a topic of their own; our guide to sea view and setback rules goes through them for buyers who want to understand why one plot allows more than its neighbour.
What is the sequence from plot to keys?
The chain for a coastal villa is the same as inland, with the geotechnical survey and the maritime line added at the start:
- Planning conditions for the parcel, obtained before the deposit
- Terrain and geotechnical survey, boundaries confirmed
- Design by a licensed architect within the conditions, with the engineering for the slope
- Permit on the basis of the design
- Construction by a registered contractor with supervision
- Technical inspection and registration of the finished house
Each step depends on the one before it, which is why our custom build service manages the chain as one project rather than handing the client a list of contacts. The buyer who tries to save time by starting the groundwork before the permit saves nothing and risks the house.
How should a buyer compare two coastal plots?
Not by price per square metre. Compare the buildable area after setbacks, the number of floors the conditions allow, the orientation, the cost of the groundwork implied by the rock, the access for machinery and the distance to water and electricity. Two plots at the same price can differ by a third in what they let you build and by a similar margin in what it costs to build it.
We prepare that comparison for clients as a short table before any viewing, from the plots on our listings and from plots they have found themselves. If you have a coastal parcel in mind, send us the number and we will tell you what we would check first.