Decisions Regarding Owning or Renting Your Homestead

It'll give me a government position within one of our conservation departments.

VannFe, it seems like you have a clear idea of where you'd like to be in the future and you're doing a good job getting there and it doesn't seem like the horses are impeding you in any way at all so I can see no reason why you would need to sell them.

If you are considering options at this stage of the game, is there any provision for renting to own a place? If a percentage of your rental went toward the down payment, you could keep the down that you have as a cushion in case you did come up against a large bill and yet you would still be working to upgrade or maintain a property that would become yours.

If none of yours or your child's health issues are such that there would be frequent critical emergencies, I really don't feel there is any need to be situated in town just for the sake of doctor appointments.

I would encourage to you watch carefully, find something that is as close to your idea of perfect as you can find and if it takes a while, it will still be worth it and you should be able to turn a few acres into additional income.

Homesteading and back trouble are a difficult mix....

This is what I did while I was in college. I was dying to get my farm, but still had a few years of college and raising 2 sons myself. I found an older home for 18,000. It needed work, but it was in the collage town I lived in and the owner held the mortgage. I gave her 5000 down. made my payments with taxes like 250 a month. I couldnt have rented a place for that cheap and I owned the house after 7 years. Then, when I was done with school, found a good job in a nicer area, I had that place to sell as springboard cash. Found a farm with 75 acres.

even tho that house was in a village, it was still mine and I could have a dog and chickens and a garden. No landlord could throw me out. I did have to do a lot of work to it, but in the end I learned how to do everything. then when I built a new house, I did most the work myself, well with my sons. We liked our 1st house, built in 1872, still had gas lighting...lol That would be a good option for you. You could save a lot of money not having such a high rent payment. There are a lot of owner hold places cheap, that cant get mortgages because they need a little work.

Are you planning to stay in NM?
There is lots of fairly inexpensive land around to buy, but it is usually quite distant from work/jobs.

There is usually a significant difference in pay between working for fed .gov & state.gov [fed pays more usually]

Find a good chiropractor to work on your back. Do it now while you're still young.

__________________
We will meet in the golden city, called the New Jerusalem,
All our pain and all our tears will be no more.....

If you have money for a down payment, but have unpaid bills on your credit report, then you need to take the money and pay off those bills. When I was looking to buy a house, I spoke with a mortgage broker for advice on what I needed to do to buy a house. My credit wasn't good, and I mentioned saving for a down payment. The broker said that the first question that would be asked was why I hadn't paid off the outstanding debt I had. He pulled my credit report and told me everything I needed to pay off. Which took me 8 months to do. I was able to buy a house with zero down, but that was in 2007 before the economy tanked.

__________________
Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea. -Robert A. Heinlein

Stay in town and concentrate on finishing your schooling. Attempting to start a "homestead" while trying to finish school coupled with bad credit and no money is a recipe for disaster.

If you are there for only a few more years, and you aren't sure if you even want to stay in the area, then don't buy. Use the time to save money. (If you have come to the conclusion, say, in 8 months, that yes, you really want to stay there, then it would be smart to buy and save the rent money.) If you are healing up from a bad injury, then that's all the more reason to deny yourself the hard work that's coming soon enough fixing a place up, because you can inadvertently set your healing time back by overworking things if you aren't careful.

I know you are itching to do something, but there's something to be said for finishing one thing (schooling) before starting something new.

Good luck!

__________________
-Northern NYS

This is sure an interesting thread.

V, you seem to have it together, so you will probably work out your best path. Seems you are making your way. Myself I would wait a bit yet, but that's just me.

The idea of going to school, single with a kid, no job, owning 2 hay burners too yet, and looking to buy a place initially just made me cringe, another person with no clue and no responsibility......

But as you type you appear to have enough sense to be working things out, and your life has enough twists in it that I probably don't want to know more details. a lot of those details probably make this all make a lot more sense.

Hope you can understand where I and others might kinda scratch our head there for a bit, when we are working many hours and can't afford half of what you are doing.....

Going for a govt job these days is a good move. About the only job security there is in this county any more. Govt keeps growing exponentially.

Paul

If I'm buying I would want it to be where I plan to be for a long time.
If I'm moving about and temporary then renting might be okay. More than two years though and I would be incline to buy.

__________________
SugarMtnFarm.com -- Pastured Pigs, Poultry, Sheep, Dogs and Kids