County Water vs. Well

[Huntmo1]

We own 30 acres in northern Missouri that we have a small 1-room cabin on with electricity. But, there is no water on site. When we bought the property, our realtor said that she talked to the county and they estimated that they could bring county water to our property for around $6K or so. Initially, I was thinking we would want to dig a well instead so that we don't have to be connected to the county system. But, I've never dug a well before and understand that it is very difficult to know the costs since it all depends on how far they need to dig to hit water.

Just curious...for those that had to make the same decision, which way did you go, how did it turn out, and what recommendations would you have.

Thanks in advance!

[unregistered353870]

I've never had a choice. Everywhere I've owned property it has either been municipal water required or not available. But I can say I much prefer the places with my own water system. It requires more maintenance on your part, but you own it. Municipal rates always go up, never seen one go down. And the quality does not always justify it.

[Harry Chickpea]

There is no one answer. People in the area can probably tell you the depth of their wells, using someone who "witches" can improve your odds. (Trivia - Trees with downward pointing limbs tend to be ones that seek ground water. Trees with upward limbs are more dependent on rain and fogs. Drill near the trees with downward pointing limbs.)

Costs of a well vary widely. An 80' well with a jet pump might be under $2K complete if you do a lot of the plumbing work yourself. You could spend $12K if the stars are not aligned.

You also have to be concerned with water quality in a well - specifically arsenic, nitrates, coliform. If wells in the area test good, it might not be too much of a concern. If not, then municipal water might be the way to go.

The downsides of municipal is that you will have an ongoing bill and be subject to increases, fees, and other governmental gee-gaws.

[redgate]

We were faced with a similar decision a few years back, and opted to improve our existing well system and set up a rain collection system. Hooking up to municipal water would have cost us around $6000 for the set up, then $50/month JUST to be connected, plus whatever we used. My in-laws next door, 2 adults who are not wasteful by any stretch, pay roughly $75 month. I can't imagine what my 7 + regular visitors would be! So, lets say even at $100/month for the last seven years, plus the initial installation, we would have reached $14,400. The county has sent out boil notices at least 3 times in just the last year, the rates have gone up almost every year, and, well, you get the idea. Our improvements to the well ran us about $2000, and our rain collection system ran us around $10,000 for the underground cisterns, plumbing, gutters, etc. So that part has already paid for itself. We did put a new roof on, but had to do that anyway, so that cost isn't really factored in. We might have paid an extra $2-3000 for the type of roof we chose specifically for the rain collection. Again, though, it's already paid for itself.

Personally, I trust well water and rain water over piped water any day! But, that's just me.

[RichNC]

I think my main question would be, are going to be living there full-time at some point, or is this just a vacation type place? If it is the later, while it is more work when you are there, I would just haul water, mostly because when you are not there you are going to need to hire someone to winterize the place and make sure water lines don't freeze in winter. Just my thoughts.

[Jim-mi]

Go to the Health Dept. for that area and find out how deep nearby wells are....... will help determine the cost of drilling a well.
Hand dug shallow wells are not at all kosher.........

And remember that if things get nasty, the muni water system could possibly not be up and running.
With your Own well you can get water with generator power....
Might be a few bucks more "up front" for your own well -----but then you have control of that precious stuff............

[watcher]

One thing to remember if you are on county water if the power goes out you still have water.

[unregistered168043]

A local well digging outfit could give you a pretty good idea of cost and depth of drilling in our area. We have good well water here. At my last place we had county water and I remember when they first started charging for it in the early eighties the bill was something like 30- 40 dollars a year. When I sold the place in 2006 it was over one hundred dollars a month!

Like all bills for services that you are dependent on, the bill gets higher and higher every year. Getting back to that last place I lived, at a certain point ( when most everybody had county water and the population started going up ) it became illegal to dig your own well and only existing wells were 'grandfathered' in.

So when I got this place here I made sure to have a well dug good and deep. I wouldn't allow myself to get roped in to that county water scam ever again.

[unregistered353870]

Originally Posted by watcher

One thing to remember if you are on county water if the power goes out you still have water.

Sometimes. Their pumps are electric, too. They usually have generators, but for whatever reason they don't always keep the water flowing. I've been in more than one power outage in a city when the water went out also. I've also heard of a few cases where they instituted boil water alerts during power outages because even though the water was still flowing, it wasn't treated properly.

[Sawmill Jim]

Originally Posted by jtbrandt

Sometimes. Their pumps are electric, too. They usually have generators, but for whatever reason they don't always keep the water flowing. I've been in more than one power outage in a city when the water went out also. I've also heard of a few cases where they instituted boil water alerts during power outages because even though the water was still flowing, it wasn't treated properly.

Another reason for the boil order is some commodes don't have anti siphon water fill devices in them ,should the water from a line back flow it can empty the blue cleaner into the city water lines . Just things they don't tell you .

[Wendy]

Here's what happened with us. There are 3 wells on this place. All hand dug. The one at the barn will keep up enough to water all the animals. The one at the house never kept up with the household use. We had to have water hauled in all the time. Then, having it dumped into the well caused the water to get all stirred up & I think some of the water went back out of the well into the ground. We had no other choice at the time though because we only rented here. It cost us $30 a load for water & we got at least 1 load per week. We had the gutters running into the well & when it was a really wet time we might get by without buying water.

Fast forward 13 years & we finally bought the house, all the buildings & 3.5 acres. We called a local well digger to get a well dug. They came & tried 2 different spots. Hit rock at 15' in one spot & 19' in the other. They couldn't dig through rock. When they dug wells by hand they were able to blast through it. Not allowed to do that now. They are also not allowed to re-dig an already existing well. Not sure why. So, it cost us $400 & we still didn't have a well dug. We finally hooked on to county water. It cost us almost $10,000 to do it, but it was the best thing we ever did. We have clean water, we have water all the time, & it costs us on average about $65 per month which is half what we spent having it hauled in.

We have water when the power is out, we don't have to worry about running out all the time. We still have the well at the barn in case of emergencies. There is another well in the pasture that we have thought about cleaning out.

For us, county water made sense. I hated wondering if we had enough water to do laundry or even take a shower.

[Nimrod]

Originally Posted by Jim-mi

Go to the Health Dept. for that area and find out how deep nearby wells are....... will help determine the cost of drilling a well.
Hand dug shallow wells are not at all kosher.........

And remember that if things get nasty, the muni water system could possibly not be up and running.
With your Own well you can get water with generator power....
Might be a few bucks more "up front" for your own well -----but then you have control of that precious stuff............

Most people in parts of MN have driven sandpoint wells. The deepest they can be is 25 feet. I don't know if Jim-mi is referring to a shallow well or the dangers of a hand dug well. The water from a shallow well can be perfectly safe to drink even though it's so-called ground water. It is more susceptible to pollution but that depends on what the neighbors are doing. Get it tested every few years and you should be fine. A well driller will not even tell you about the possibility because they won't get to drill a deep well if you choose a driven sandpoint. I don't think I would want a dug well just because of the things that could fall in there. The idea of a dead rodent in my water supply is a big YUCK.

Look into where the municipal water supply comes from. Many are the same well water you could get but treated and, maybe, filtered. Others get their water from a river which contains the effluent from the towns upstream.

I agree with those that say get a well. You will not be subject to the edicts from the water company or their ever increasing bills.

[Huntmo1]

Thanks to everyone who has provided feedback so far. We have been leaning toward a well for all the same reasons people were saying on here. Plus, we don't currently live on the property...we hope to build in the next few years, but I would rather not pay a recurring bill for monthly water usage if we don't really need to. I'll check with some local drillers and see if we can get an estimate.

[Sawmill Jim]

Wendy sounds like the well driller had poor equipment If they can drill 15,000 foot in the Rockies a water well should be easy

[Dutchofsc]

I was faced with the same decision in December of last year, and decided to go with the well. We had a 6 inch well drilled, 220 feet deep. It produces 75 gallons per minute and had a static water level of 50 feet.

If I was to do it again, I would pay someone to put the hole in the ground and plastic casing, and I would place the pump and plumbing myself. The best quote I got quotes was for $10 per foot of rock well and $6 per foot for the casing. My casing ended up being 120 feet.

Having a well is often the best choice, but there is no guarantee that the driller will hit water, the well can run dry, especially after seismic activity, and there can be water quality issues. Despite all the bed things listed, I decided to have complete freedom and have my own water source.

Let us know if you get some pricing or if you talk to the neighbors to see what they have.

[TnAndy]

Originally Posted by Sawmill Jim

Wendy sounds like the well driller had poor equipment If they can drill 15,000 foot in the Rockies a water well should be easy

I'd agree. They typical well here drills thru anywhere from a few feet of dirt to a hundred or so before hitting bedrock, then drills until they hit water. They have to case the well down thru the dirt and about 5-6' into the bedrock, and from there on, it's a hole in rock.

[Declan]

Knock on the door of some neighboring properties. Wells in our area or very hit or miss both in terms of quality and quantity of water. There is also a big debate about whether to drill or punch the well. Punching costs more but some people swear they get less particulate issues in their water. I have heard others swear that when they punched a new well they ended up with more particulate issues than they had with their old drilled wells. Another issue in this area is how far to go down. If you go down to the first good layer of water--usually around 70 feet--you are going to save money but that water table can be very hit or miss in terms of meeting household demands, especially if there are kids in the house. If you go down to the deeper water, it costs quite a bit more but never runs low- I think the deepest one of those I recall hearing of was in the 270-300 foot range. Filters are not required in our area, but if you don't and have PVC pipe, plan on replacing that pipe often.

[Rustaholic]

My well is a 2" hand driven to about 50 feet in the mid 60s.
It was here when I bought the property in 1976 and it is still giving us all the water we have needed. Plus it is so great tasting I provide drinking water to our church in town and my mother and sister on the other side of town.
If I was in your place I would drive or drill a well myself.
Two guys back then did it I could do it now.
I probably will in a few years out back.

[Jlynnp]

When we bought our place it already had municipal water in place. While the water pressure can suck when we were without power for 7 1/2 days we had water. We have thought about putting our own well in we talked to our neighbor who has his own well and his advice was not to unless we have to because it is rock every where. We even had to core drill for fence posts in the dog runs.

[Jim-mi]

In Michigan shallow wells have been illegal for many years.
I set a well point at 25' many many moons ago . . . Years later when it plugged up my dad was forced to drill 250' for good water...........because the shallow wells were then illegal........in Michigan.

Well drillers around here can and do poke thru anything.......