intro/new opportunity feedback request

[deanm]

Hi everyone. I used to read this forum awhile back to feed my fantasies. All of a sudden things have gotten very real.

My wonderful 96 year old Grandmother passed away last weekend and left her country home in south central Illinois to my Father. My Dad has given me the option of living there. The house sits on a large plot of land that used to be gardened extensively by my Grandma. Behind it sits several acres of a combination of pasture and forest with a creek running down the middle that was left to my Uncle when my Grandfather died 40 years ago and has remain untouched since then, which my uncle says he would rent to me entirely for $1/year.

I am approaching 40 and have been on disability for the last five years or so due to severe anxiety and depression issues I've dealt with my entire adult life (problems started late in college). For many years I have dreamed of being able to live on and make a living off of farming of some sort of sustainable agriculture such as organic, grass feeding, and free range concepts(goats have been prominent in those thoughts). This is my opportunity to fulfill those dreams and hopefully get out from under the burden of living on the dole.

Last year, I worked for a vegetable farmer friend of my Dad's, who also sells hay, straw, oats, and corn. It was very tough work, but it did me good. The solitary nature of it suits me well. My big hindrance, however, is that I have very poor mechanical aptitude.

Another major hindrance is that I have zero capital or credit to invest in get ting started. So, obviously it looks like goats or any other type of livestock are unfortunately out for the foreseeable future as fencing in all that hilly acreage through trees and a creek (perfect goat country) would I assume cost several thousand dollars, not to mention shelters and buying the livestock to start off with.

It appears the only option to start is organic gardening. The house is fronted by a high traffic four lane highway. I imagine a farm stand could do well there. Once I make a little money off that, perhaps I can get some chickens and maybe fence in a little of the pasture for a few goats or cattle to provide meat for myself.

I guess I'm fishing for other opinions. What would you do in this situation to start trying to make some money off this land with next to nothing to invest. I just would love to find a way over the next few years to clear atleast $15,000 so I can live the modest life I live now without having to be on the dole.

What books would you recommend to someone with virtually no gardening experience about getting started with organic gardening or any other book you would find useful for someone in my situation.

I'd also like to hear from anyone who perhaps moved into a parent's or grandparent's home after they passed. I'm feeling a little anxious about how it will be, moving into and living in the house my Grandma lived in my entire life and died in.

It's something I plan to get over, because the opportunity is just too good to pass up because of any stupid anxieties. The house is 50 years old, but built by my Grandfather who was a building contractor. It's all brick and kept immaculately by my Grandma for all these years. It's small, as it was meant to be my Grandparents retirement house, but I'm single with no kids and living in a crappy studio apartment now. It also has a good sized basement.

My Dad is only going to charge me the same rent I pay now. So, even if I was not going to or able to work the land in some way to get myself off disability, it still would be worth making the move in terms of quality of life, not to mention the satisfaction of keeping the house in the family.

But I absolutely want to work it in some way and am hopeful for some positive feedback/ideas/opinions to that affect.

Thanks in advance for any advice anyone gives me and for reading this entire thing; I congratulate you.

[Mel-]

can't speak to anything other than the house situation. my father owns the house his parents bought in 1945 when he was 13. It's been empty for 20 years now since my grandfather died. I have lived in it before for a short time as well as visit there and it didn't bother me one bit so far as ghosts or anything. I have thought I might someday live there again just because I hate to see it abandoned with all the memories I have of my grandmother. my father doesn't want to sell it and no one in our family wants to live in tennessee or rather I should say leave all family behind here in indiana.

[Up North]

It sounds like you have answered your question already. For your peace of mind and quality of life I would packing my bags ASAP. Once I got done there then I would figure out what I would do. Read a much as you can. Start small and work up from there. Deffinatly take anvantage of all the smart people on HT. You can really learn alot here!

Heather

[Dirtslinger]

Spend some time at the library researching small scale farming ventures (honey etc). If you can afford the rent you should be able to make a little extra on the land. Plus getting your own wood for heat, growing some of your food etc etc you could do well if you are willing to work for it.

[RoseGarden]

Wow, what a windfall for you. It is surely a lot to think about and digest. If I were in your situation, I would move into the house and just love it and take care of it as the house your grandpa built and your grandma loved and cared for. What a tribute it would be for you to cherish and maintain it in their memory. Don't be anxious, it's your family's home, and nothing could be more wonderful than that!

Also if I were you, I would just live there, continue your disability and garden for yourself, your own food. Maybe build a small pen and get some chickens for your eggs and entertainment. Do a little roadside market. And just see how things go for a while before making any carved in stone, long term plans. Just live in the house and enjoy it and practice gardening and keeping some chickens. And I would think you are right about moving being an improvement in your quality of life. You would likely have more peace and quiet there than in a studio apartment, more room for hobbies and projects to keep busy with, too.

Books.... there are so many, it's hard to recommend just a few. I would strongly suggest that you contact whatever county the house is located in, contact the agricultural extension agency and they can give you tons of gardening information such as planting dates, fruit and vegetable varieties, pest control, compost information, crop rotation, pasture maintainance etc. They are a really good resource. And if you can find any garden books for your area specifically, those are usually better than a generic gardening book that is not area specific. For example, what I grow in my part of the country won't do well in the northwest.

Good luck in your endeavour, and please let us know how it goes. It sounds like an exciting time for you, please don't be anxious.

[KristineinKS]

I would second what others have said - move there, get settled in, do some reading & decide what you'd like to do. You don't need to do something with ALL of the land immediately. Start small, and work your way up from there as you feel able. That is essentially what I'm doing with my small piece of land...as a single mom of four, I'm often cash-poor (and working on the credit situation!) & certainly mechanically inept (not to mention that I'd never had a "real" garden until moving to the country!), but I've made do the best that I can, and things get easier all the time, so I know that it's possible. I can understand being anxious, I'd only ever lived in big cities prior to moving here...but by starting small & easy you'll gain the confidence to move ahead to tackle bigger projects. Go to the library & get some good gardening books, and consider fencing a small area for chickens & perhaps a couple of goats (welded wire fencing & t-posts aren't expensive and are very easy to add on to), and go from there...

Some good general books to get you started...I started with "Storey's Basic Country Skills," Carla Emery's "Encylopedia of Country Living," and "You Can Farm: The Entrepeneur's Guide to Start & Succeed in a Farming Enterprise" by Joel Salatin (I actually found the last book to be the most useful - it will give you an overview of the best centerpiece agricultural opportunities, with ideas for complementary enterprises, as well as telling you exactly what you need, how to go about things, etc.)

It sounds like an absolutely wonderful opportunity and I wish you the best of luck!

Kristine

[chris30523]

I would find a way. Continue with the disability till you can make it on your own. You might find with some good ole fresh air and hard work alot of your disabilities will disappear. Also there is alot to be said for the self confidence you get knowing you can take care of yourself .

[Wisconsin Ann]

Go for it. Move today.

I, too, have fought chronic depression and anxiety all my adult life. When I'm at the farm (we're WAY out in the country, no neighbors...just wild life, sound of birds, smell of nature) it simply lifts and floats away.

Working in a garden is extremely theraputic, too, btw.
As to suggestions....honey bees are excellent. See if you can find a small apiary around there and go talk to the owner. With the land and creek (bees need water close by) you've got the hard part out of the way. Don't worry, they're actually easy to work with. Bees, I mean.

Organic garden...yup. good way to make money if you have a retail market to tap. Herbs are great moneymakers. Sell either plants or, even better, fresh herbs leaves/stems in little bags or boxes. You canhave an herb garden all year by taking them inside, too. Big herb plant, chop off some leaves, sell 'em. Hard to kill herbs, too.

Go to a larger grocery store and check out the produce aisles. See what kind of things you can grow that seem to be selling at high prices. oh yeah...fresh tomatoes from the garden...WOW. Sweet 100 cherry tomatoes (variety) go like crazy up here.

When you're ready to start marketing, don't forget to send a few freebie things to the family to take to work with them. Word of mouth is the small farmer's best friend.

Spend some time making a cool label for your products. Farm name. "organic <whatever>" keep it simple, but attractive. Highlight the organic bit.

and chickens are your friend for gardening. they eat the insects and small weeds. Fertilizing as they go great little beasties. heh. almost forgot..they give you eggs and meat, as well.

hmm...later on, when you have a bit of money for some fencing...get a feeder pig. Pasture feed it. (some breeds do REALLY well on pasturing...they're natural foragers). Pigs are known as "mortagage lifters" by old time farmers. They eat scraps, they forage, they grow big, they sell well.

If you haven't done it already, post on the gardening forum. Those people are simply fantastic with products, selling, gardening help.

OOoooo... lots of work, but WHAT a wonderful thing!

[anniew]

All good advice above. If your county's cooperative extension has a master gardener program, you might enroll in that as it will give you a condensed version of a college course in gardening...soils, pests, veggies, ornamentals. They may have a requirement that you "pay back" with a certain amount of service time, but you just learn more that way.
Since you are starting at ground zero in gardening, this could really jump start your information bank.
Ann

[next61]

All I can say is that the depression it has been well documented that will decrease with physical exercise. It is recommended to exercise regularly when you have depression. Working on your farm is the best opportunity to see "life in pink", it works!
Good luck to you; I wish I had the same opportunity though!

[Maura]

What a wonderful opportunity for you!

It's spring, so you can jump in and get started. If you want an organic image, grow heirlooms. Plant at least three different kinds of tomatoes and see which ones do well for you. Ditto for other plants. And grow flowers. If Grandma has a flower garden keep it going. Many of them would probably make good cut flowers, and these you can sell along with your vegetables. You can have livestock without breaking the bank. Chickens are wonderful, inexpensive, and picturesque as well. If you order fifteen buff Orpingtons, they will forage on bugs and lay eggs, they look pretty too. They will need a small coop behind electric fencing. You can use portable electric fencing. You can also use portable electric fencing to keep your sheep or goats in (three or four to start). You just move them around the house to keep the lawn mowed all summer.

[deanm]

I'm positive I'm going to make the move. It feels more and more right by the hour.

The idea of starting slow is a good suggestion. It's a concept I haven't done too well with in the past. I tend to go overboard and flame out. My lack of resources though should keep me in check. However, I am really wanting to get out from under this burden of guilt and shame.

Being on disability for psychological/emotional reasons, makes it even more difficult to go places and talk to people than it already was. When you talk to people, conversation quickly comes around to "What do you do for a living" type questions. It's tough for me to deal with, especially since I'm able-bodied.

Anyway, a possibility I was awake all night kicking around is that I would not make the move until late in the year. Instead, I would work for that vegetable farmer again. That way I would make the move with a few thousand dollars to do something with for next year. Plus, I'd have more time to read alot of books and prepare.

I would need to make the 2 1/2 hour drive (one way) down there weekly though to take care of mowing the yard and stuff. Also, most of the garden over the years has been seeded over with grass; so I would need to do some tilling. I assume it would be better to do that this year and then either mulch it with the grass clippings or plant some kind of cover crop, like alfalfa to keep the grass from coming back. (Atleast that's what I came up with after one night of reading the gardening forum here.)

There is also another friend of my Dad's, near where I am now, who has successfully done pastured poultry for years and I might go out there a bit to get a primer on that. I was out there awhile back when they used the tractors; but in the last few years, they switched to day-ranging them in rotating poultry netting paddocks out of a house they don't move.

I'm not a bird fan or a poultry eater really, but I realize this is the best option for starting out with livestock. I really would like a way to figure out a way as soon as possible when I'm out there to raise some grass-fed red meat even if it's just on a scale to feed myself.

I find the red meat more satisfying and the increased iron, zinc, B12, and omega 3 (from grass feeding) is all better for my brain then poultry. As a former vegetarian/vegan who hates animal cruelty, I can't bring myself to buy the commercially raised meats in the grocery stores, which with my budget really limits my choices.

Thanks again for all the encouragement and sorry for another long post.

[deanm]

And grow flowers. If Grandma has a flower garden keep it going.

She doesn't have a flower garden per se. But she did love flowers and had them all around the outside of the house. Another thing I know zero about. I couldn't even tell you what kind they all are. But keeping them from dying is of immediate concern.

[KristineinKS]

If you're interested in pastured poultry, you might also check out Pastured Poultry Profits by Joel Salatin...not to keep plugging his books, LOL, but they're very easy to read & helpful for the step-by-step instructions and loads of other details that you'd want to know about - he also writes a book on raising beef if you want to go that route.

[deanm]

Originally Posted by KristineinKS

If you're interested in pastured poultry, you might also check out Pastured Poultry Profits by Joel Salatin...not to keep plugging his books, LOL, but they're very easy to read & helpful for the step-by-step instructions and loads of other details that you'd want to know about - he also writes a book on raising beef if you want to go that route.

Thanks. I've got some of his books on my long list of books I need. My
Dad, who just retired from the USDA, has been active in introducing pastured poultry to the area over the years and has had Salatin speak at seminars before. So I am familiar with pastured poultry in a peripheral way.

I probably will go out to that farm I mentioned before to compare the method they use now to the tractor method I am more familiar with. I'm wondering which is the most humane and provides the highest quality meat (i.e. - in terms of omega 3).

[65284]

Deanm, I hate to sound the only sour note here, but. Before you give up your present situation I think you need to have a long talk with your Dad.

What are his long range plans for the property? Does he contemplate selling it, is there a chance he would need to money for health or long term care for your parents, if so would you have an opportunity to buy it?

If you stand a chance to inherit are there siblings that you would have to deal with or buy out? If it were me I would have to have a written agreement clearly stating the succession of the property before I invested a any labor, emotion, or money into the place.

Even though we don't like to think about such things we never know when we will lose a parent, he could be gone in a day or a year after you move there.
The last thing you need is to put down deep roots there, make improvements and establish a thriving business only to have to give it up for someone else to benefit from.

JMHO.

[deanm]

Originally Posted by 65284

Deanm, I hate to sound the only sour note here, but. Before you give up your present situation I think you need to have a long talk with your Dad.

What are his long range plans for the property? Does he contemplate selling it, is there a chance he would need to money for health or long term care for your parents, if so would you have an opportunity to buy it?

If you stand a chance to inherit are there siblings that you would have to deal with or buy out? If it were me I would have to have a written agreement clearly stating the succession of the property before I invested a any labor, emotion, or money into the place.

Even though we don't like to think about such things we never know when we will lose a parent, he could be gone in a day or a year after you move there.
The last thing you need is to put down deep roots there, make improvements and establish a thriving business only to have to give it up for someone else to benefit from.

JMHO.

Thanks for the sobering info. My Dad told me that if I didn't move there; he would sell it and most likely my other uncle (not the one who owns the acreage behind the home and lot), who lives very nearby would most likely buy it. He says it doesn't matter to him who is giving him payments; though I'm sure he could get more from him than me.

My parents are not rich; so the concerns you raised about a health or long term care crisis is a valid one. They are both in very good health now; but you never know what might happen in the future.

You've given me more to think about regarding siblings too. Not to mention, all the acreage owned behind the lot by my uncle. He is having increasing health problems and since it is an asset he doesn't use; it would be logically one he would look first to sell if the need arose.

I guess I better slow down here and get some more information. Thanks again.

[chris30523]

Yes I would get more info.You are never guaranteed to inherit take it from me.We had a ranch in Wy that had been in my moms family since 1800's my aunt took care of it all these years so we could have it when she passed on.Well she died and left everything to my uncle he is 92 and he sold the place then called us told us our aunt died and by the way I sold the ranch Sad but true.

[65284]

Originally Posted by deanm

Thanks for the sobering info. My Dad told me that if I didn't move there; he would sell it and most likely my other uncle (not the one who owns the acreage behind the home and lot), who lives very nearby would most likely buy it. He says it doesn't matter to him who is giving him payments; though I'm sure he could get more from him than me.

My parents are not rich; so the concerns you raised about a health or long term care crisis is a valid one. They are both in very good health now; but you never know what might happen in the future.

You've given me more to think about regarding siblings too. Not to mention, all the acreage owned behind the lot by my uncle. He is having increasing health problems and since it is an asset he doesn't use; it would be logically one he would look first to sell if the need arose.

I guess I better slow down here and get some more information. Thanks again.

Well, let's look at the other side of the coin now. If you could buy it how much more, if any, would the payments be than you are now paying in rent?

Do you think you could make enough income from the place to cover the difference between your present rent and a homestead payment? Of course you will need to account for taxes and insurance, but a lot of that could be offset by having the ability to grow much of you own food

If you can buy it would your Dad be willing to give you a little of your possible inheritance in advance by reducing the price or interest for you?

If either of the above scenarios are viable maybe you could work out an arrangement so Dad could carry the note and without a down payment.

If he would you would be much better from a fiscal standpoint, you would be building equity instead of throwing money into the bottomless pit of rent
payments.

If you can swing it that would be great, I just think you need a solid legal document in place before moving.

[Mid Tn Mama]

Regardless of what you would inherit or how long you will be there, it sounds like it would be physically and mentally a positive thing to do. I wouldn't invest in books, use your library, interlibrary loan and the internet to research. We spent five years researching how what we wanted to do things and it worked out great.

I'd recommend the Carla Emery book, Back to Basics by REader's digest.

Also, go online and read the older mother earth news articles on doing this on a dime. Use the countryside magazine back issues online as well.

Best of luck.