You bought the land. Now you’re looking at a blank parcel wondering who to call and in what order, and nobody handed you a sequence. Most new landowners in the Durango area work it out the expensive way, one wrong phone call at a time.
This is the order of operations, start to finish, so you can plan the whole project before you spend a dollar.
The short answer
Call an excavator first, before a builder. Confirm your survey, contact the county or the City of Durango about permits, bring in a septic designer if your parcel needs an OWTS, coordinate power and water, then hire your builder. The foundation crew comes last. Everything below explains why.
Why the sequence matters
Here’s what we see more than anything else. Someone buys a parcel in the Four Corners, builds a spreadsheet, adds up the house, the grading, the well, the septic, the driveway, and the utility hookups, and gets to the bottom of the column. The number is bigger than they planned for. They sell the property instead of building on it.
That’s not a reason to panic. It’s a reason to get the full picture early.
Site infrastructure is a separate budget from home construction. Both have to be planned independently, and the sequence is what tells you what each one actually costs on your specific parcel.
Step 1: Call an excavator, not a builder
Most people assume the builder is the first call. It isn’t. Before a builder can do anything, the land has to be cleared and graded, the underground infrastructure has to go in, and the building pad has to be formed and compacted. None of that’s the builder’s job.
The excavator is the contractor who makes raw land buildable. Everything else follows.
When you call us, we walk your property, look at access, slope, drainage, and visible rock, and talk through scope and sequence. You leave with a real picture of what site preparation on your parcel involves. Estimates are free, and there’s no obligation on either side. Our site preparation services page lays out the full scope of what we handle before your builder arrives.
We’ll also point you toward the other trades. Builders, plumbers, electricians, surveyors, and septic designers are all people we work with regularly around Durango, and connecting you to them is part of how Mike Zarlingo has run this company since 2018.
Step 2: Understand what site infrastructure includes
Site infrastructure is every system and improvement that has to exist before vertical construction starts. On a raw parcel in La Plata County, that usually means driveway and road access, water from a well or a municipal connection, an onsite wastewater treatment system if there’s no city sewer, power from La Plata Electric Association, and all the grading and earthwork underneath it.
Each piece has its own contractor, its own permit, and its own timeline. They don’t all run at the same speed, which is why sequence matters as much as budget.
One thing that applies to every parcel: Colorado law requires a call to 811 before any digging so utility operators can mark their lines. One call, every time, before the first cut.
Septic and OWTS in La Plata County
OWTS stands for onsite wastewater treatment system. It’s the regulatory term Colorado uses for a septic system, and most rural and semi-rural parcels in the county need one because there’s no municipal sewer to tie into.
La Plata County requires that OWTS installations be done by a licensed installer on the county roster. We’re licensed in La Plata County, so you don’t need to source a separate contractor for your septic. Permitting runs through La Plata County Public Health under Colorado Regulation 43, with local county regulations that took effect March 2, 2026.
We perform soil analysis to determine the best septic system for the project. If the terrain is difficult or the water table is high, the county may require an engineered system, either a mounded system where the drain field sits above grade, or an advanced treatment unit.
Our septic system installation in Durango page walks through how that process works.
Driveways, grading, and GPS precision
A driveway on a raw parcel out here is more than gravel and a culvert. You’re looking at slope management, a correctly sized culvert at the access point, and a compacted base that can carry construction traffic before the house even exists.
On larger residential projects and most commercial work, we grade with 3D smart grade GPS satellite technology. It puts us on the same equipment a survey crew uses, so we hit precise elevation without grade stakes or string line. Stakes get clipped, buried, and knocked over during construction, and every reset costs time. Grading right the first time is what your foundation crew is counting on.
Step 3: Permits and who pulls them
The first question to answer is jurisdictional. Whether your parcel sits inside Durango city limits or in unincorporated La Plata County changes which office you’re dealing with, and people get this wrong constantly.
For unincorporated parcels, La Plata County handles building permits and land use review, and La Plata County Public Health handles OWTS permits. For parcels inside city limits, the City of Durango handles building and land use, and excavation and right-of-way permits go through the Engineering Division at 970-375-4810. As of July 1, 2026, the City handles plumbing and gas permits directly.
Your driveway access onto a county or city road typically needs its own permit. Setbacks, easements, and zoning all affect where the house can sit, and none of it is worth discovering after you’ve hired people. Getting to the right office early is the cheapest step in this entire process.
Step 4: Site foundation preparation
Site foundation preparation is the work of excavating, grading, and compacting the building pad so it can carry a foundation. It’s the last phase of site work, and it’s where precision earns its keep.
The footprint gets excavated to depth. Topsoil and organic material come out, because organic material compresses over time and can’t carry structural load. If soil conditions call for engineered fill, the subgrade gets prepared for it. Then the fill is compacted in layers and tested, and a soils or geotechnical engineer typically has to certify that compaction meets spec before footings get poured.
Our excavation services in Durango cover this phase from the first cut to the finished pad.
When you hit hard rock
Hard rock is common around Durango. It’s a normal local condition, not a surprise, but it changes both cost and schedule.
We break and remove it mechanically, using hydraulic hammers and breakers mounted on excavators. That takes longer than moving soft soil and it costs more. An experienced local excavator can usually flag likely rock conditions on a site visit, which means your budget reflects reality from the start instead of getting revised halfway through.
Step 5: Building on the foundation
Once the pad is graded, compacted, and certified, the foundation crew takes over. They pour the footings, which transfer the building’s load into the ground, and the stem wall that sits on top of them and supports the structure above grade.
Building on the foundation is the handoff point. After the foundation cures and passes inspection, your builder starts framing and the project becomes home construction rather than site work.
Everything before that handoff has to be complete, permitted, and inspected. Skipping a step doesn’t save time, it just moves the delay somewhere more expensive. If you haven’t found a builder yet, that’s a conversation we can help with, and our residential construction in Durango page shows how the site work phase connects to what follows.
Who you’ll need on your team
A licensed surveyor handles boundary and topographic work before design. GPS machine control doesn’t replace that, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.
A geotechnical or soils engineer tests bearing capacity and certifies compaction. A septic designer or OWTS engineer produces the system design the county has to approve before a permit gets issued. If your parcel needs a well, the driller runs on a separate permitting and drilling track that starts earlier than most people expect.
La Plata Electric Association needs a call before you trench or clear right-of-way for power service, since they set the line extension and trenching specs. Your builder starts after the foundation is in. Plumbers and electricians come through for rough-in during framing.
We can connect you with most of these people. That coordination isn’t a favor, it’s part of how we work.
Why local experience matters here
We’ve been working in the Durango area since 2018, and Mike’s family has been in the Four Corners since 1939. That shows up in practical ways: knowing which lots in Hesperus sit on shallow bedrock, how permitting actually moves through La Plata County, what LPEA needs and when, and how a short season affects your schedule. We serve Durango, Bayfield, Hesperus, Mancos, Cortez, and Pagosa Springs.
A contractor from out of the area doesn’t carry that. When you’re making decisions on a property you’ve walked once, local knowledge is what keeps the budget honest.
We hold a 5.0 Google rating, and we’re a licensed and insured General Excavation Contractor.
You know the sequence now. Let’s talk about your land.
Tell us about your parcel. The acreage, the location, and what you’re planning to build is enough to begin.
From there we walk you through what site preparation on your specific property involves, what permits apply, who else you’ll need, and what to budget for before your builder starts. That’s the exploration call, and it costs you nothing.
You can also review our full range of site development services if you want the complete scope first.
Contact us to get a free estimate.
Animas Excavating
2942 E 4th Ave, Durango, CO 81301
(970) 403-2787
Licensed and insured General Excavation Contractor serving Durango and the Four Corners region since 2018.
