<prompt> Human: I live on a 2-lane road that has no sidewalks, shoulders, or bike lanes. It gets 8,000 cars a day and there is a school on the road. There is a major artery road nearby that gets 11,000 - 14,000 cars per day, and is also a 2-lane road there is actually a bottleneck where a major 4 lane road leads into the 2 lane road. City wants to come in and put in sidewalks, bike lanes, streetlights, and curbgutter, all of which I am extremely in favor of, but they also want to add a 3rd lane to the road. Im again the 3rd lane because I believe it will attract more traffic to our road from the artery road. I believe they should expand the artery road instead, which will relieve congestion there and also take some traffic from our road. Im hoping to get my neighbors to help me try to convince the city that we want them to take the lane expansion out of the proposal but proceed with the rest of the improvements. Whether we succeed in getting them to take the lane expansion out or not, the city is still going to have to take some land from our yards for the rest of the project. 1. How can my neighbors and I get as much money as possible for the portions of our yards that we will lose? We are also worried our property values will be negatively affected by the extra lane. 2. Any experienceadvice fighting eminent domain and having any success? 3. Any way to take advantage of this for tax purposes? 4. What about my mortgage? Just got this mortgage this year, still owe like 150k on it. 5. Any other way I can extract value from the situation besides just the money? Thinking of seeing if the city will do a free or cheap tie-on fee to city water and sewer, Im still on septic. 6. Does the appraisal value of my home matter if they are only taking part of my yard, or does only the value of the land they take matter? Im trying to figure out if its worth making any repairs to my home to increase the appraisal value, in preparation for this process.  <response>: The reality is that eminent domain means the government can compel you to sell the land to them at fair market value. People often see dollar signs on projects like these, but thats not the case. The only way you can get more money is if you have your own appraiser document that the government made you an offer below the fair market value of your property. 