who has moved from the city to the country?

[Kelly FG]

tell me about your experience? How did you pick an area to move to? Was it in your state? Can you live off your land now? Was it easy to become part of your new community?
Any stories & info you have would be great. DH & I want to get out to the country somehow but don't know if we are being reasonable about our expectations.

[landmoswalt]

Do it!! We moved from the city to country a year ago and I will never go back. We only moved to a small farm with 6 acres but we love it. Waking up to the rooster crowing is alsome and we are having goats babies for our first time and the kids think it is the most amazing thing ever. I do to! We have never seen birth from an animal so far the kids have witnessed our sow having babies, and our goats. It has been a great thing for our kids. This year we will start our first ever CSA and sell our veggies and fruits. We are excited looking at the seed catalogs,and deciding which poultry to buy this year. It is a way different way of life and we are really liking it. My son who is 10 wants to go off grid now so we are planing how to do that. He is studing solar power everything first we will start with the barns then the house. So my kids are really studing to get us a wonderful farm life. Good luck in looking for a country place. You will not be sorry! Lori In Kansas

[MullersLaneFarm]

I'm not quite sure how to answer. Paul grew up on a farm, then lived in the Denver area for 20 years. He stilled kept his draft horses and worked them where ever he could out there. I've lived both in town and in the country all my life. I've never been without a garden.

Neither of us have ever been fully plunged in 'city life' so when we bought our acreage, our dreams were complete.

Can we live off our land? Yes, but we both have jobs off the farm to pay the mortgage and animal feed. We raise all our meat (poultry, pork, beef), eggs, dairy, honey; about 85% of our vegetables and fruit.

What are your expectations? This lifestyle is hard work, but if you love it, then it's a pleasure. Have you raised a garden? Do you know how to preserve the harvest? Have you raised animals? Learn now, in the city, to live the life you eventually want to live. Learn the skills you will need.

What ever you do - please, please don't build a McMansion in the country!

[turtlehead]

Originally Posted by Kelly FG

tell me about your experience? How did you pick an area to move to? Was it in your state?

We moved from Atlanta (population of several million) to literally the middle of nowhere (nearest town is 20 miles away, pop 1400). We moved in the summer a year and a half ago.

We picked our area in a round about way. First we figured out exactly what we wanted in a piece of property - how much space, did we want timber, water on site, how much cleared land, etc. As far as I'm concerned you have to do that before you do anything else.

Then we started looking in north GA but found it too expensive for our budget. We expanded to east TN/western NC because we have family there and know and like the area. Still way too expensive. So we expanded to central TN and almost bought a piece of property there but the deal fell through.

We also have family in southern OH so we expanded our search to eastern OH (southern was too expensive) and WV. We learned that there are oil/gas wells in WV, PA, and NY and that some properties come with free gas, which we added to our "must have" list.

We kept searching in WV, PA, and NY via the internet and made a couple of trips to see parcels. Fell in love with this one, made an offer, and purchased it.

It took us well over a year to decide what we wanted, find it, and buy it.

Can you live off your land now?

Heavens no! We both work full time and the house on the property dates back to the late 1800s (read: it needs LOTS of work!) so our progress has been slow. We did have a garden last year and canned some things. We had lots of losses, too, due to gardening in an unfamiliar climate - but we learned and we know what pests/diseases to look for and how to combat them. Next year will be better.

There was a chicken house already on the property so we made some repairs to it and got 25 chickens from Murray McMurray (they come in the mail, did you know that? I was amazed). We butchered all the roosters but two and we kept all the hens (14, but one disappeared). We free range the chickens - that is, they wander around the yard all day and have unlimited access to water and feed. We collect eggs. One of our goals is to have a flock that raises its own young rather than having to rely on mail order or incubators, so when any of our hens go broody we plan to band them so we don't butcher them. That's the first thing we'll select for in our breeding, is broodiness.

We also have rabbits now. We are raising them in a fenced colony area on the ground rather than in hutches. We have three does and one buck, and butchered our first rabbits last week.

We don't have any larger animals because we don't have any fencing in yet for them, but we'd like to try goats or pigs. We'd also like a milk animal, probably goat but maybe cow, but right now we don't feel we have the time (or the fencing) for one.

Was it easy to become part of your new community?

VERY! I visited a church a few weekends in a row and the pastors wife came with a basket of home made bread, some garden veggies, and home canned bread-and-butter pickles and apple butter. Everyone has been that nice. Our neighbors are great. The folks at the feed store have been wonderful help. We just go in and say "Okay, we have yet another stupid question" and they laugh and help us out. Everyone has been delightful. Go in admitting you're inexperienced and that it matters not a whit how things were done in the city. Folks live in the country and they live poorly and without stuff because they choose to. They think the city folks are chasing the wrong dream so if you refer to how "successful" or "educated" people do things they'll not appreciate that.

Any stories & info you have would be great.

Lots of stories on my blog:
http://byteshuffler.com/rospo/blog

[Lannie]

We finally got to move out of town 3 years ago. Hubby and I are retired, so we don't have to work outside jobs, but on the other hand, we needed to find someplace that we could afford on our limited income. We ended up in the Middle of Nowhere, SD. Our post office is 30 miles away one way, and (decent) shopping is 100 miles away the other way. Not much else between them.

I absolutely love the solitude, though, after having lived in or near a large city all my life. I just hated city life and everything that went with it. It's even hard for me now to go shopping once a month. It's just another chore that has to be done.

We've put a garden in, which we've only had success with one year (the first). Then the deer found it. Ever since, we've been trying to figure out a way to keep the deer out of the garden. It's easy to go out and plant seeds and tenderly care for your garden all summer, but not so easy to go out one morning and find everything eaten down to the ground. Kinda makes you want to cry, especially because they wait until it's too late for you to start over with anything except radishes.

My chickens are a joy! I was told by a lot of people that they were messy, noisy creatures that would cost more to feed than I'd ever get back in eggs. Well, they were wrong. I just adore my birds, and of course, they're so spoiled that they run to me every time they see me (so at least it SEEMS that they like me back!). As far as I'm concerned, the eggs are just a bonus.

We have enough pasture that our horses can be happy, lazy pasture bums, and at least during the summer, they don't need to be fed twice a day like I used to have to do when we had them on drylot.

I've also been wanting to get a milk cow, which is no mean feat in the middle of beef country (who would want a silly old milk cow, anyway?). It took 3 years, but we finally located one about 100 miles away. She's being bred right now and we'll be bringing her home the end of February. She's half Jersey and half Hereford, bred to a Jersey bull, so I'm hoping her first calf is a heifer. If it is, I'll keep her. If it's a bull, it will go in the freezer. In the meantime, we've been getting untreated milk from our neighbor (and I use the term "neighbor" loosely - she's several miles away), and I've been practicing making buttermilk, sour cream, cream cheese, cottage cheese and hard cheeses in preparation for when I'm up to my ears in milk.

Possibly in the spring we'll be getting a couple of piglets to raise for meat. We still have to build them a run and a shed, but we have it all planned out, so we just need to get the lumber and some STRONG fence material. My hubby is building me a real butcher shop so we can process our own instead of having to haul them 100 miles to the "local butcher." That will be a learning experience for me, since all I've ever butchered was deer, but we both figure, even if it all ends up as hamburger or sausage, WE GREW IT. That's the important part to us.

We can't sustain ourselves here yet, and probably never will be able to, simply because we don't have the equipment or the acreage. We only have 15 acres and no haying equipment, so we still have to buy that, as well as feed grains. My garden is self sufficient, though, and I've saved seed from everything so I no longer have to buy it. We also have an electric water pump and a 250' well, so even if we got a hand-pump, it would be a job getting it up here. I'd like to have one eventually, just so I'd know we could have water if there was no power for some reason. Food-wise, it would be hard, but if pressed, we could live off what we produce (once we get the cow and pigs, of course). No more coffee, no more rice, but at least we'd have veggies, milk and dairy products, and meat and eggs.

Anyway, all that was to say that getting out of the rat race and into the "wilderness" was the absolute BEST thing we've ever done. Neither one of us regret it and every day is wonderful, no matter HOW much work there is to do. At least we're doing it for US, not someone else.

~Lannie

[MullersLaneFarm]

Originally Posted by Lannie

Possibly in the spring we'll be getting a couple of piglets to raise for meat. We still have to build them a run and a shed, but we have it all planned out, so we just need to get the lumber and some STRONG fence material.

I think pigs are easy to pen than goats!! We took combo wire panels with the smaller holes at the bottom. Dug a trench 6" deep and buried the panels. Secured them with T posts. On the bottom 12" or so, we had to weave some wire to keep the small weaners in.

We also have an electric water pump and a 250' well, so even if we got a hand-pump, it would be a job getting it up here. I'd like to have one eventually, just so I'd know we could have water if there was no power for some reason.

You will never regret having a hand pump. Regardless of everything else, you have to have water.

[alpacamom]

We very recently moved from the city to the country and love it to death! Thankfully it has been a mild winter so far as far as snow goes, but we're having some brutally cold temps these days. I wouldn't trade this for the world and don't think I'll ever go back to living the city life.

How did you pick an area to move to? Was it in your state? Can you live off your land now? Was it easy to become part of your new community?

For us, we moved out of state. We tried to find some affordable property in our area in Illinois, then hubby was offered a job in Iowa City, Iowa, and we found a real estate agent that specialized in farm properties. We knew we wanted at least 5 acres, but prefered more than 10, we knew how much we could afford, and we figured that we could spend a little more on a place if it had the outbuildings and fencing we'd need than if we had to put it all in ourselves. We also wanted a place that was within 30 minutes of my husband's job. Then we mapped out a 30 minute drive time from dh's job and looked for properties on the internet within that circle. We also wanted to live in an area with few zoning laws so we wouldn't have to worry about that.

We can't live off our land yet as we just moved in at the end of November, so I have to start my garden this coming year and see how it works out and we haven't brought our animals to the property yet. Hopefully that will happen in the next month or so.

As for becoming part of the community...the people across the road came over to welcome us and have plowed our driveway for us when we had a big snow a few weeks ago, another neighbour up the road stopped by to say hi when we were working outside one day and a lady whose property backs up to ours stopped in with some home made caramel corn shortly after we moved in. She invited us to her church, but we don't attend church, so we don't go. I've recently started getting to know homeschoolers in our county, so I'm sure that will help us get to know people in the area better.

I would highly recommend just doing it. Like my hubby said when he bought my first alpaca for me for Christmas a couple years ago, "You can always wait for the right time, but there is never going to be just the right time. Sometimes you just have to do it or it'll never happen" and I'm so glad he did!

[Terri]

Well, we started at my husbands job, and we followed the major roads out a reasonable commute. We were in the country then, and there were some affordable properties.

I love it out here.

I have NEVER tried to live off of our little homestead: I raise the good stuff but I buy the flour and meat. I raise blackberries by the gallon, tomatos, and such. I have chickens and a home-made green house, Christmas trees and fruit trees.

I started in San Jose, but there was no breathing room for us, so when DH got a job in another state we moved to a smaller city.

In such a large city as San Jose it would not have been possible to drive out to affordable land.

[Jim S.]

We moved in 1990 from Williamsburg VA to central TN. We did so because my wife wanted a farm. She was raised on a diary farm. Her Family lives about 50 miles away. Her father taught me a great deal about farming while he was alive. We originally had 13.75 acres, but we have bought another acreage behind us now that I formerly rented, so we have 25 acres now. We had paid our original farm off for just 6 months when we bought the new acreage, and so we are paying off land again. But it makes our farm have enough land to self-support in hay and livestock (we raise meat goats, but I started with cattle).

I grow my own feedstuffs as much as possible, and harvest my animals' nutrition needs from the free sun shining on my place as much as I can. (See Allan Nation and Joel Salatin.) To me, that is a self-sustaining farm, rather than whether it generates enough money to live from. Money alone is a false and deceptive measure of success.

I hear all the time about folks who live completely off their land, and I have never found them. Everyone I have met personally or known about has some other kind of job, even people who are touted nationally as proponents of living self sufficient off your land (uh, their off-farm job being writing articles and books and going to seminars -- all paid!).

I love the country lifestyle, but it means an awful lot more work. You have to like to work, and find it fun, to live on a farm long-term. I love to work, and prefer physical labor. My office job in the city is all sitting at computers. There are times when I am envious of my coworkers, who for example can stop off after work for a drink whithout advance planning while I am driving home to feed animals. Farming can at times be a lonely lifestyle. It helps if you are good friends with yourself.

But your farm will return satisfaction and even joy in ways that may surprise you. New life always amazes me, for example -- there is no white like the new white of a newborn's coat. Or a project well done satisfies. Then there's the nice part about having some room between me and my neighbors (tho in our case suburbia is catching up quickly, and our farmland will likely become a suburb in another 20 years, as my last way of "farming" it before I retire).

It's a lifestyle choice, and your best bet on supporting yourself is to be very flexible in identifying needs you can fill. I feel fortunate to have been able to have a city job, with its pay and benefits, and yet still actively farm my place. Even the encroaching houses on acre lots in developments all around me, I see as an opportunity for the future, when I want to cash out and retire.

Keep your eyes open for opportunity in everything. Best of luck.

[Crystal H]

We moved from Silicon Valley to Sleepy coastal Oregon. We left our crazy commuter jobs and most of our family.

We LOVE it.

This is a great place for us to raise our boys and participate in a community. We do not live completely off the land as there is a learning curve but hope to grow most of our food eventually. We Are on 7 acres on riverfront property. So we fish, have chicken, getting goats and have a decent garden.

Some of the things I wished I had known before moving here...
that it is a depressed economy. Not that that would have changed my mind but I wouldn't have been so surprised at the poverty around me.

I miss going to nice restaurants as there aren't any in town. If thats my biggest regret... I am truly blessed.

Live now....there might not be a later..

Crystal

[e.alleg]

I made the move and I love it. I dislike crowds and hot weather so western NY was perfect for me. In the city it is easy to remain anonymous, out here it is impossible. I call on classified ads in the paper for people selling stuff and they are like "hey is this Ed?" hehe when there are only 1000 people within 20 square miles it gets like that. I don't make a living off of farming. The thing about depressed areas I found out is that rural poor people are MUCH diferent than urban poor people, I live in one of the poorest counties in the state and it also happens to be one of the safest counties in the state. I don't expect my house to go up in value any time soon but I didn't buy to resell. Before I used to head out to the mountains every chance I could get to get away from the city, now I live in the mountains and I feel like I am "away" every day and it's great. I do miss the beach though, I lived 20 minutes from the beach at my old house. It is hard not being close to family, but it was harder living a life that I didn't want commuting to work putting the kids in daycare.

[Dec429]

I moved out of the city, Cape Girardeau, MO in December of 2005 to be with Westwood and start our life together.
I grew up on a huge dairy/grain farm, and moved to the city on 1978 when I started college. At that time, I could not wait to get off the farm and to the city, where IT was all happening. I have to say I enjoyed the conveniences of the city.
While I was raising my daughter, Amber, I loved having the grocery stores, doctors, and my mama right there.
After Amber got married in 2004, and my 8 year relationship was crumbling down in front of me, I realized what had made me happy all my childhood years was the country. Not necessarily the farm, bad memories, but the peacefullness, the neighbors, the comaraderie of the country folks.
Then, I met Dennis, and he had this beautiful place in the Ozarks of Arkansas. He and I had met for weekends between his place and mine and knew we were right for each other. But, the first time I came down to his place the, our place now, I felt like I had been raptured!
The stress, the noise, the blaring vehicle horns, the coldness, of the city melted off of me like Colorado in June.
I have been here for 13 months now, and even my family, (Amber, my mama, extended family), will tell you, and they tell Dennis, Don is the person we USED to know.
Do we make a living off of our land? No, we both work outside jobs. But, we are now working from home. Not spending much money on gas, eating out, so maybe in that aspect we are making a living here.
Peace of mind and getting off the anxiety meds, the heatburn meds, and the Ibuprofen for constant headaches, is priceless.

Yes, can y'all tell I am happy? Finally?!!

[Kelly FG]

thank you all so so much for sharing your stories with me!!!!
My DH & I live on Long Island, NY. one of the most expensive places to live in the US. We each have one child from previous relationships, my DS is 19, DH's DD is 13 so that is why we are here now. Almost 3 years ago we bought our 1st house together in Eastern Suffolk County, its much more rural here than the areas closer to the city. Our little neighborhood has a private lake in the middle & its very quaint. However, land is hard to come by & we only have 1/4 acre. So last year I started my first organic garden from seeds in the greeenhouse my DH built for me, I wasn't very successful but I learned alot & plan to triple it this spring. I'm thinking about adding a couple of fruit trees also. Last march I also started my first chicken flock from McMurray. I ordered 25, chose 8 to keep & gave the rest away. Raising chickens has been such a rewarding, joyful experience. I love everything about them. We built them a coop & run, but they free range our small backyard most of the time. We are looking into starting to add solar energy to our home. we are very frugile & creative with our money-unlike the people in this area. People here work endless hours to spend money on junk to keep up with the neighbors, I hate that mentality.
So our 5-10 year plan is to get off this island-we look at property in TN online-buy a small farm within 45 minutes of a city that we can get jobs in. Possibly near a state park or other attraction. I want dairy goats & alpacas & meat rabbits, I want to grow more food. DH wants to grow a niche crop like ginseng or bamboo. I'd love to have a couple of rooms as a bed & breakfast. We want to run off solar or wind or both & I hope to be able to bring my Mom & her SO & my Grandma with us.
So that is where we are at, I wish we could move forward with our plan sooner, but my stepdaughter lives mostly with her mother & my DH can't move so far away yet.

[perennial]

We moved rural 1 1/2 years ago and absolutely LOVE it. We moved from a suburb of a city and had every convenience you could have, but didn't like it - even though it's where we grew up. It had become very expensive to live and crowded.

So, we went online and picked a few states we were interested in and i found info about them, looked at real estate on line to get idea of cost, looked at pics online of different seasons. I looked at tax costs for real estate and income tax and if it was a small business friendly state.

We narrowed it down to one state, then an area. Then i started looking if there was employment would be available to hubby. We then made a circle on a map around the employment area out to how far hubby would want to commute at the most.

He then got a job (he had remembered he had contacts here), he came out looked the area over and for land and interviewed, then the next month i came with him and we found land and he had a job lined up. Then went home, sold house and started looking for a rental out here so we could build.

That was our approach.

I think as a city person going rural, it's important to know ahead what you need to have convenient. For me, i wanted a town with grocery store, etc., but didn't want/need to be near chains stores, etc. Just the basics were important for us. I meet people who didn't think about that and feel board, they didn't realize there is generally no food delivery (pizza), no big pharmacy, movies, so called "things" to do (costly things)! And, because of that, they tend to spend more time in their car going the distance.

I love the fact that in a small town and i've gotten to know many people and know most of the business owners on a first name basis and well enough to see how they are doing.

The only things i miss from MA is the blizzards and family. We had a couple people come visit us, but it an adjustment when you spend you first holidays without extended family.

Other than that, it's was the BEST and most wonderful thing we could have done for ourselves and kids.

[Terri]

Make sure you visit land before you buy it. A realtor might or might not be honest, but even an honest one will not necessarily tell you the down side of the property.

Check out the stores, the churches, and the cafe'. If you are not happy in the community, you will not be happy. And, since you both are interested in selling, check out the market for your product as well.

Unless, of course, you wanted to ship the ginsing back to long island, then you could check the market out now!

[e.alleg]

I agree with the advice to go look for yourself before buying but don't be quick to judge by appearances. Some of the most run-down looking places might have the best people in them.

[Corky]

We did not plan this move at all. It just happened. We both believe it was Gods doing.
We were contented in the city, even though I had always said I grew up in the country (here) because we were poor but am now too poor to move back.
We had raised four Children by then. The youngest was still at home but he was 16.
We owned our own retail business that my Husband ran and I worked in banking. I have sense 1968. Business was very slow one Summer day and DH was reading the property for sale adds in the paper. We had been thinking about buying an acre or two along Elk River in the Noel area so we could have a little privacy camping. That was our favorite passtime then.
They decided to take the day off of work and go check out this property
dh saw in the paper. They did and even took me to look at it the following weekend but it was way too much land and too expensive for us.
While they were there they got to talking to the neighbor that was remodling a small house he had purchased on the river.
dh told me I should see that little house. He just loved it. It was not for sale and we forgot about it all.
The next Spring we went for a drive one Sunday down into Arkansas as we often did. On the way home we decided to check out the campground we usually went to as we had heard it was not going to be open anymore.
All of a sudden DH slammed on the brakes and turned into a drive. I screamed as I thought he blew a tire! He said IT'S FOR SALE!!
WHAT? The little house he had seen the summer before.
It was so small compared to what we had in the city but we thought it would work for a Summer cabin if we could aford it.
We made an offer. They were insulted! We checked it out a little more and realized that it had 11 acres with it and was worth much more than we thought.
I ran loan papers at the bank just to see what would happen and they were aproved. I was shocked! There was no way we could afford to keep both homes so we talked and decided to move and commute.
That worked for a year for me and two years for DH. He then sold the business and retired. I got a job in this area and have been working 20 minutes away for over 10 years. I will be retiring next month.

No, we are not self sufficient. We have a nice garden and chickens, goats, alpacas and a donkey now.
We have raised lots of other animals and butchered our own meat but we are not good enough to raise good meat. It is always tough no matter how young so we don't do that anymore. We are mostly just enjoying our place now.
We eat fresh summer vegtables. I can and freeze a lot. We also enjoy fresh goat milk and eggs. We pick wild fruits and gather nuts.
We don't hunt and I was raised on wild game and really don't like it so we don't care about that. We are very happy here and believe that this is where we are supposed to be at this point in our lives.

We were very involved in the local community for years but have retired from all that now too. Our Friends and interests have moved to the community where I work and know most people in that town. Most of the people we knew in the near town are gone now. Moved away.

[Jenn]

I lived a busy Army life in a lovely German townhouse with big garden looking over an organic farmer's field. I spent my last year there planning my country life and moved to 6 acres in Central TX and kept sheep and poultry. The move from professional female soldier to Yankee amongst Texas natives (it's STILL hard on women and horses) was a bigger jump than from small garden to big acres. Had few friends but garden club and fellow homesteaders helped. Fast forward 10 years. 4 years in a small gardened house in a small English town and again spent the last year planning for a country home. Ended up on 3 acres, a posh house in a middle to posh tiny pocket miles from everyone, with no trailer houses but goats horses cows nearby. More like a suburb except the pet sitting exchanges with neighbors are a bit more complicated. Again being in Alabama is a bigger shock to my SD and PA roots than being out of the towns I've lived in since or Pittsburgh where I grew up.

Sometimes I miss walking to bagel green grocer florist bakery pizza shops but nowadays few people have that anyway, and even in pedestrian England it was a ONE-TWO MILE walk to do that so not a daily trip for me.

[faithgoeson]

I grew up in the woods and live in them now. My new hubbie, whom I met online, comes from the city all his life. It is quite challenging when I want him to complete my honey-do list and he has no clue how to do it!! To me, building chicken nests is as easy as breathing. He wants blueprints and a budget while I'm pulling out treasures I found in the shed for it. We are really having fun, though. He stands in awe when he sees cows and trees, and I needed to remember what a blessing it is to have them.