My Downsizing Project

Started by wildbil, November 18, 2008, 01:30:45 AM

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wildbil

Some land has recently caught my eye, but I'm not sure about buying land in the winter.

The place is 6.45 acres of mixed field and woods(regrowth it appears from clear cut). The neighbors are mostly amish farmers, and a few normal homes nearby. The road is a secondary paved road. Theres a condemned house near the road that could be fire wood. The well is useless as its too far away from where I would build. The land is at the base of a hill , but it isnt low where water would pool, and it evens off.  its going for 15.9k which its been on the market a while already and I could probably work a deal if the seller needs to get rid of it.

Should I just wait until spring to look at it? we already have a good layer of snow.
"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."
-Thomas Jefferson

glenn kangiser

If it was here it wouldn't be there tomorrow. 

That's 1/2 the price of a new car.  The car may last for 10 years or less and guaranteed it will have problems by 3. There's nothing wrong with driving a horse and buggy.  I'd probably only worry about the "normal" homes. :)

The land will be there forever.  It could even make you rental property for your old age if you decided you didn't like it.

Check it out.
"Always work from the general to the specific." J. Raabe

Glenn's Underground Cabin  http://countryplans.com/smf/index.php?topic=151.0

Please put your area in your sig line so we can assist with location specific answers.


Squirl

It depends on how much information you can get.  In my areas I can get tax maps, topo maps, soil maps, and flood maps online.  $2000 an Acre is my normal price break point.  Check with the county office if a recent survey was done too. 
If I could spend some extra time hiking around it and asking the neighbors, I would be comfortable.  Everybody has a different level of comfort. If it is a lower price than others in the area and has been on the market for a while, it may have something wrong with it.  It might not be the land but the legal paper work.

cordwood

Quote from: wildbil on November 26, 2008, 07:48:26 AM
Some land has recently caught my eye, but I'm not sure about buying land in the winter.

The place is 6.45 acres of mixed field and woods(regrowth it appears from clear cut). The neighbors are mostly amish farmers, and a few normal homes nearby. The road is a secondary paved road. Theres a condemned house near the road that could be fire wood. The well is useless as its too far away from where I would build. The land is at the base of a hill , but it isnt low where water would pool, and it evens off.  its going for 15.9k which its been on the market a while already and I could probably work a deal if the seller needs to get rid of it.

Should I just wait until spring to look at it? we already have a good layer of snow.
Check on restrictions for building on that small of land. Here in Ar. less than 10 acres is completely different for what can and can,t be done. Plus 6.45 acres don't leave much room to hide from the "Normal Homes" with ???
Winter is when I like to look at land, Less under growth to crash through and when the leaves are off you can tell more about the lay of the land as well as "WHO" can see "WHO" :o. Snow might make finding corner markers a little harder.
I cut it three times and it's still too short.

considerations

"Snow might make finding corner markers a little harder." 

Nor would I close a deal without a survey.  People creep their fences and lawns over property lines all the time, and the real estate agent sure isn't going to tell you squat. 

I've even found markers that have been moved or disappeared.."how" is anybodies guess.

My neighbor is a great gal, but over the years she got 15' of her cleared area into my property along a 600' run. 

The survey staking was a delicate moment in the evolution our relationship.   


wildbil

Thank you all for your wisdom, The property search is still going strong. I've seen a few 10 acre peices all of which costing around 30k and that have been on the market for a while. I keep having this feeling with this economy that if I dont get started, the crap economy will be hindering me from my plans of a mostly self sufficient lifestyle :(. I wish it would at least pick up for a few more years.

My plan is morphing a little bit too. I am thinking of a 200 sq ft building with loft on a few country acres just to have a place for us to stay and sell my small town house. It would give me some practice before a larger building, and would not need permits to build. But I do have a few questions...Does loft space count for sq footage? and If seating was built into the home, like a seating area that was sticking out of the home
_____-----_____ would that count as sq footage?
This wouldnt be permanent just a way to get out of my home easier before building another, but it would have to keep a wife and baby until the city house was gone.

"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."
-Thomas Jefferson

MountainDon

Quote from: wildbil on November 28, 2008, 04:52:39 PM...Does loft space count for sq footage? and If seating was built into the home, like a seating area that was sticking out of the home
_____-----_____ would that count as sq footage?


Depends/ I know that's not very helpful, but it comes back again to the local interpretation, or method of doing things.

Here and back home, the square footage for a building is calculated by using the exterior measurements, not by measuring the interior floor spaces and adding them together. Back home a  "bump out" was not considered in totaling unless it provided actual floor space; not sure about where we are now.
Just because something has been done and has not failed, doesn't mean it is good design.

CREATIVE1

Also, I think in some places you can build a 200 sq foot building without a permit, but only if you already have a main house on the property. 

wildbil

To update you all, I went around and looked at the places I had thought would be good for my project. Every place has something wrong with it. One has not just a house but a full 3 crumpled barns and other trash scattered over it, the next was a frozen cedar swamp, several others were way too close to neighbors. so my list is back to zero. anything in the 5-10 acre range around here right now is shabby. I might decide to look at a few 3 acre parsels, but it would be nice to have enough land to hunt and collect wood. :( d* d* d* d* d* d* :(
"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."
-Thomas Jefferson


fritz

This my not seem like significant advice, but be patient and keep looking.  I laughed at my friend who told me it took him 3 years to find his property.  "I'll never take 3 years!"  I told him,

it was 3 years +  of fairly active looking over a 30 - 60 mile radius before I found mine.

Best of luck


considerations

My search took almost 2 years and a 60 mile radius.  Bad water, bad zoning, marshes, ridiculously steep slopes, you name it, I found it.

Its the Zen of property searching, but by the time i found this place, I knew what I was looking for. It became a form of recreation, and I did sightseeing that helped me really get to know the different areas. I quit talking to real estate agents, and just found the property addresses on my own through the MLS and GIS systems and then went and looked them over by myself.  Since they were bare land, I didn't have to worry about owner/renter occupants, etc.

I'd been through the process of qualifying property so many times that I was able to weigh the lists of pros and cons pretty quickly, and had a pretty good idea of what kind of offer would land the purchase.

In my case I traded off investing in an initial period of junk hauling to get a year round stream, high ground for building and a cedar grove shielding me from neighborly views. 

What I didn't know, and really lucked out on, was how many great "neighbors" are out here.

Economically, I'd be surprised if things get better any time soon, so time may work to your advantage if you can sequester the funds you are planning on using for the property. 

Since everybody's life has ultimately the same outcome, its the journey that counts.

Mike 870

1 acre of woods can give you almost 2 cords of deadfall a year.  So 3-4 acres with a small, well insulated house may be enough.  If it's been timbered this doesn't apply.