Tell me about WV,MD,V,PA

When I was a court reporter working out of DC but traveling a lot I found my dream place in Cumberland, MD. I took several days off to explore possibilities ,d was really impressed with the town and how pleasant the people were. However, my bossan who was very astute, said that Cumberland had a climate like Canada and I'd get stuck in the snow in winter. I don't know how she got that information but in the 20 years I worked for her, she never gave me false information.
Berekley Springs and Bath get a lot of city people (from DC) who have probably driven the prices up. There is a wonderful conference center there. They come to a conference and want to escape the city life!
Now to see if this posts without an error barrier.

If you're thinking of Cumberland, I would go East about 10 miles or so and check out Flintstone. Also check out Rocky Gap State Park, and Beans Cove, PA.

Beautiful area, and great people. I grew up there. :0)

My kids really want to live in a place called 'Flintstone', they thought it was better than 'Bath'. I'm in the Colorado mountains, I can't imagine snow being worse there, but I understand that the snow is 'wet' compared to what we get. We can't make a decent snowball unless we spray the snow with water ( I am completely serious!!)

We can live anywhere as long as there is reliable high speed internet. That really opened up a lot of area.

Tilly

High speed internet does open a lot of areas. Fibernet is one of the companies that have installed a lot of fiber optic cable in WV. I'd contact them to see where they've built infrastructure. That means if you use I68 as a backbone you can probably go west as far as Morgantown, about a 3 hour ride to Frederick, and pick any of rural places off the main road. Flintstone is one of those. At some point going west you'll find WV University faculty who have moved east to escape Morgantown congestion and prices living on local farms. You should see that around Bruceton Mills for one.

Our state homeland security director sucked a lot of money out of the feds by predicting a terrorist attack in DC would lead to a mass exodus via I68 into WV. I thought the whole idea was malarkey. Take that for what it's worth to you.

The area around Cumberland does see fair amounts of snow and some killer fog. I've done more than my share of white knuckle driving through there in the winter. Big snows can shut the local roads down.

nomad had it right. the entire area expensive. i am 40 minutes or so away in southern pa. i think you would be more comfortable in pa, but finding acreage for a decent price will be hard. developers snatch up every nice parcel they can.

i live just west of the ridge and route 15, route 550 to 15 and route 70 are all convenient ways to get to Frederick. route 70 would be a good route if you are willing to travel from the Hancock MD/ Indian Springs MD/ Warfordsburg PA area. it may be possible to find land from there north to Mercersburg PA or even further north to the Roxbury PA area. another area may be in the triangle between Gettysburg, Chambersburg and Shippensburg PA. route 30 to 15 would be the way to get to Frederick. i have no idea what you might find northeast of Frederick in the York area and north towards Harrisburg. my guess is that it is all expensive, and just like all of the other areas i posted, it is probably just a bit too far to travel everyday unless it is really worth the commute.

this is really a nice part of the country. it's just too bad so many other folks thought so too about 10-15 years ago. the developers went nuts and much of it has been chopped into 1/4 lots.

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this message has probably been edited to correct typos, spelling errors and to improve grammar...

"All that is gold does not glitter..."

The entire area is expensive, but PA land and houses are about 40% cheaper than compareble Maryland land and houses. That's why so many Marylanders move across the line to PA.

I live about 6 miles from Shippensburg, PA. It is a nice rural area that is part of the Cumberland valley. Also, there are a lot of dairy and other farms around me, and I am in the middle of a large old order (horse and buggy) Mennonite community. So, Old Order Mennonites come by my house all day long on wagons, buggies, and bicycles. There are a number of nearby farm stands that sell local produce. Also, the sale of raw milk is legal in PA.
I-81 runs through the valley and is convenient to get on to travel either north towards Harrisburg or south towards Hagerstown.
Concerning home schooling, a number of families in my church homeschool. In fact, I do evaluations for some of them. As someone mentioned earlier to be a PA homeschool evaluator you do not have to be state certified. The other options are to have taught 2 years in a PA school (can be private), or be approved by the superintendent of your local school district. Currently I am approved in 3 local school districts.
Hope this is helpful.
Bob

I am looking for a place to lease over that way. Is not easy.
Most likely have to lease the place I own in Oregon until the market gets better.

Have you checked out Craig's list? I have been finding more viable places to look at through there, than the Real Estate agents.

Google satellite maps are also another good tool to get a birds eye view of what ever place(s) you are interested in, to make sure there are no close neighbors.
Also use Map quest to get the mileage and how much time each place we look at, will take to get to from DH work. Make sure you add time for traffic.

Also recommend calling the County you are thinking of buying/renting a place in, and make sure you know the acreage you need to have animals/livestock.

I found out in Essex and King George counties, I need to have 10.1 acres to have 4 small horses and say, chickens and what not.
Also a lot of other rules, we just don't have here in Oregon. But is important to know before you buy.

I looked into MD, property taxes are higher than VA by a lot. But MD property taxes are no higher than where I am at now, here in Oregon. Pretty scary.
WV and PA are too far away from my DH new work, so I don't know about those.
Other than Real Estate agents, showing us perfect places, within our budget in WV.. down side,, takes 3 to 4 hours one way to get there. (rolling eyes) If you decide to use a Real Estate agent, finding one that will listen to you is priceless!

Good luck!!

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Shari

PM me if leasing a few acres over in Mt Airy MD might work for you.

The problem with real estate agents is, they work on commission. They will make more on a house or condominium than a land purchase with far fewer complications!!!
For a flat fee (try $500) you can hire a buyer's representative. Of course, the challenge is to find a caring, competent one!
Since Virginia has a farm link program, it's logical other states would. Certainly they do in New England. Someone told me Rodale has a really good site for Pennsylvania. You can advertise for what you want plus see whatks on offer. Since I am a touchy feely person, the google maps and statistics don't help me at all. I gotta BE there and pick up the vibes! Others operate with statistics but if I had horses, I would be looking where there were concentrations of horses and horse facilities. As a trail horse person, I'd want to be on a trails network.
I note that somebody disputed my mixmatch avoidance advice. Well, I used to work in DC but had virginia plates. Cops lurk in DC and serve all kinds of tickets against virginia drivers. In turn virginians drive into DC at christmas time to buy liquor where the taxes are less. The dc cops make megabucks because the nice little housewives have handguns in their glove compartments! The virginia cops lurk on the other side of the bridge. But then, I like to be kind of invisible and blend in. Having an out of state licemse plate isn't just a monetary thing. It's a kind of flag calling unwanted attention. Anyway, Maryland has some strong virtues as do the other states. With gas prices like a tinder keg, I personally want to be as near work (in the same state) as possible.

Bring lots of CASH.

Fredrick MD. is about 1 hour commute from Washington DC. where common sense is difficult to locate.

Wish it would, just a bit to long a drive for DH.

Also put an Ad in the Virgina farm link program. Also another good one to put a want ad in, if a person wants some farm land.

The thing with driving in different states and the Police... you get that anywhere sadly. Were I live, it is closer to shop in WA across the bridge, than shop in OR.
Same idea with DC and the rest of the states around there.

Here's a link to the craiglist site I am looking at. I am targeting horse properties for lease, not sure if you need to lease or can buy.. but here you go. VBG
http://fredericksburg.craigslist.org...pe=A&bedrooms=

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Shari